T  H  E     V9  O  R  L  I> 
OUTGROW  CHRISTIANITY 

ROBERT  •  POLLOK  •  KERR 


f.\         >2» 


^J  PRINCETON,  N.  J.  -        % 


Presented    b^ro^  ~S-~S  •  Ju<A^\\  5^ \a  ^r^. 

■ 
BR  123  .K47  1901 
Kerr,  Robert  P.  1850-1923. 
Will  the  world  outgrow 
Christianity 


WILL     THE     WORLD 
OUTGROW  CHRISTIANITY 


Will    the  World 
Outgrow  Christianity 

And   other   Interroga- 
tions  on  Vital  Themes 

BY    THE 

Reverend  Robert  Pollok  Kerr,  D.D. 

A  uthor  of  "  The  Voice  of  God  in  History,'"  "The  Land  of 
Holy  Light,''  "Hymns  of  the  Ages"  etc.,  etc. 


Fleming   H.    Revell  Company 

Chicago,     New  York    &    Toronto 

Publishers  of  Evangelical  Literature 


COPYRIGHT,  igOI, 
BY  FLEMING  H. 
RKVELL     COMPANY 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Will  the  World  Outgrow  Christianity?      .        .  9 

Will  the  Bible  Live? 16 

Will  Men  Continue  to  Believe  in  God?  .  .  25 
How  Shall  We  Pray,  that  Our   Prayers  May  Be 

Answered? 34 

How  Can  God  Be  Good,  and  Let  Man  Suffer?  .  45 
Can  God  Be  Sovereign,  and  Man  Free?  .  .  57 
What    Is    the  Greatest   Defect  in   our   National 

Character?  ? 67 

Shall  all  the  Denominations  Unite  and  Form  One?  84 
How  Can  the  Church  Reach  the  Masses?  .  .  95 
Can  We  Do  Anything  Immortal?  ....  105 
What   Is  the  Connection   Between   Doctrine  and 

Work? 116 

What  Is  Woman's  Work  in  the  Church  of  God?.  124 
How   Can  Man   Know  that  He   Shall   Rise  Again 

from  the  Grave? 133 

How  Is  the  World  to  Know  that  Jesus  Christ  Is 

Alive,  and  that  He  Is  Divine?         ...        141 


DEDICATED  TO  THE 
MEMORY  OF  MY 
BELOVED  UNCLE, 
THE  REV.  DR.  JAMES 
WITHERSPOON     KERR 

R.  P.  K. 


WILL  THE  WORLD    OUTGROW 
CHRISTIANITY 

"he  shall  judge  the  poor  of  the  people,  he 
shall  save  the  children  of  the  needy,  and  shall 
break  in  pieces  the  oppressor.  they  shall  fear 
thee  as  long  as  the  sun  and  moon  endure, 
throughout  all  generations." ps.  72:  4,  5. 

Here  is  a  prophecy  of  the  coming  of  the  Mes- 
siah. He  is  set  forth  as  a  Saviour  of  the  poor 
and  oppressed,  who  should  deliver  them  from 
oppression,  and  "break  in  pieces  the  oppress- 
or." The  greatest  oppression  is  sin  which 
enslaves  men  and  grinds  them  under  its  tyranny, 
and  the  arch-oppressor  is  Satan.  The  Messiah 
was  not  to  be  sent  to  overturn  his  dominion  and 
to  set  men  free.  Then  the  prophet  psalmist  lifts 
his  voice  in  direct  address  to  the  coming  Deliv- 
erer, and  says,  "They  shall  fear  Thee  as  long  as 
the  sun  and  moon  endure,  throughout  all  genera- 
tions."  This  shows  that  whatever  else  may 
change,  here  is  one  unchangeable  thing,  the 
reign  of  Christ,  and  the  reason  is  that  He  delivers 
men  from  oppression  and  destroys  the  oppressor. 
This  answers  the  question,  Will  the  world  out 
grow  Christianity,  by  a  tremendous  negative — 

9 


io        Will  the  World  Outgrow  Christianity 

not  so  "long  as  the  sun  and  moon  endure — 
throughout  all  generations. "  From  the  nature  of 
this  deliverance  it  must  always  remain,  because 
(i)  it  is  always  needed,  and  (2)  because  it  is  a 
complete,  a  perfect  salvation,  leaving  nothing  to 
be  desired. 

Christianity  meets  the  perennial  wants  of  man, 
and  deals  with  permanent  facts.  The  world  will 
never  outgrow  it  because  it  will  never  outgrow 
the  things  that  make  it  needful.  One  of  these  is 
sin;  sin  in  man's  nature,  and  sin  in  his  life. 

Man  is  a  sinner  just  as  much  as  he  ever  was. 
Society  is  not  redeemed  from  sin  as  a  mass,  but 
as  individuals.  Men  are  saved  one  by  one,  and 
man  needs  to  be  saved  from  sin  just  as  much 
now  as  he  did  two  thousand  years  ago.  Every 
man  is  born  a  sinner.  Sin  is  hereditary,  but 
holiness  is  not.  A  good  man's  children  are  all 
born  sinners,  and  need  salvation  just  as  much  as 
their  father  did  before  he  became  a  Christian. 

This  is  directly  opposed  to  the  doctrine  of  evo- 
lution taught  by  a  section  of  modern  scientists. 
They  make  the  principle  of  heredity  the  law  of 
nature,  and  of  mind,  and  claim  that  by  a  process 
of  development  men  rise  continually,  grade  by 
grade,  towards  perfection.  On  this  theory  man- 
kind would  outgrow  the  need  for  regeneration, 
and  for  pardon,  for  he  would  outgrow  depravity, 
and  sin  no  more. 

But  the  facts  are  all  against  this  theory.  Men 
have  not  risen  into  a  higher  life.      Man  is  no 


Will  the  World  Outgrow  Christianity        1 1 

better  by  birth  and  in  his  nature  than  he  was  six 
thousand  years  ago.  Man  without  religion  is  as 
bad  as  he  ever  was.  We  can  see  that  all  about  us 
all  the  time.  We  need  read  no  book,  we  need 
travel  nowhere  to  see  the  truth  of  this.  Men  do 
the  same  things  now  that  they  did  in  the  days  of 
Noah,  Solomon,  Caesar. 

Each  one  of  us  knows  it  by  his  experience  with 
himself.  In  his  own  breast  he  finds  the  same 
evil  nature  and  desires  that  he  reads  of  in  ancient 
history,  and  he  feels  that  he  needs  a  Saviour  and 
salvation  just  as  much  as  men  did  in  the  days  of 
Christ  upon  earth. 

Another  permanent  fact  is  sorrow.  Men  have 
as  many  sorrows  as  they  ever  had.  We  suffer 
from  poverty,  disease,  disappointment,  and  be- 
reavement just  as  men  have  always  done.  We 
need  the  bounty  of  God  for  our  poverty,  the  balm 
of  Gilead  for  our  wounds,  the  comfort  divine  for 
disappointment,  the  handkerchief  of  the  Gospel 
for  our  tears. 

Is  it  not  so?  Are  you  any  less  in  need  of  the 
ministrations  of  religion  than  your  fathers  were? 
Have  you  any  less  sorrow ;  any  less  anguish  of 
heart?  No;  you  know  it  well,  and  you  know  that 
sorrow  is  a  perennial  fact  of  human  life. 

A  third  permanent  fact  is  death.  Science  has 
not  abolished  death,  nor  has  culture  of  the  mind. 
All  men  die;  and  all  men  need  something  to 
cling  to  in  the  hour  of  death.  Death  stalks 
abroad  everywhere.     He  enters,  without  call,  and 


1 2        Will  the  World  Outgrow  Christianity 

without  knocking,  the  hovel  and  the  palace. 
Will  it  ever  be  different?  Will  men  ever  cease 
to  die?  No.  So  they  will  never  cease  to  need 
what  religion  has  to  offer  man  at  the  gates  of 
death. 

But  all  this  does  not  prove  that  the  world  will 
not  have  another  religion.  It  proves  that  men 
must  have  a  religion;  but  the  question  still 
remains,  Will  the  Christian  religion  survive? 
May  not  a  better  one  be  found? 

We  reply,  No,  because  Christianity  answers  per- 
fectly the  needs  of  man;  there  can  be  nothing 
better  than  a  perfect  answer.  Babes  will  always 
need  milk,  and  babes  will  never  abandon  milk 
because  it  is  a  perfect  answer  to  their  needs. 
Milk  contains  all  that  is  required  by  the  exigencies 
of  a  babe's  conditions.  So  with  adults.  There 
is  no  possibility  of  men  outgrowing  the  ordinary 
food  they  feed  on,  because  it  perfectly  answers 
their  needs.  Bread  and  water  will  always  be 
popular,  for  that  reason. 

In  the  matter  of  sin,  man  can  have  nothing  better 
than  Christianity,  because  it  does  all  that  a  sin- 
ner needs.  It  gives  him  complete  justification. 
That  is,  it  takes  away  his  sin,  and  gives  him 
God's  perfect  righteousness.  This  meets  the 
case  finally,  and  completely.  I  need  to  be  made 
a  new  creature,  and  to  have  my  sins  forgiven, 
and  to  be  given  a  righteousness  that  will  satisfy 
God.  Now  God's  righteousness  must  satisfy 
God,  for  it  is  His  own.     Men  will  never  discard  a 


Will  the  World  Outgrow  Christianity         13 

salvation  like  that.  It  is  perfect  because  it  is 
divine.  No  one  can  invent  any  better.  Can  God 
Himself  devise  anything  better  than  perfection? 
than  His  own  righteousness?     If  so,  how? 

Now,  as  to  sorrow :  what  can  be  better  than  the 
Christian  resource?  It  shows  God  overruling  sor- 
row for  man's  happiness.  If  a  man  be  a  Chris- 
tian, God  makes  all  things  work  together  for  his 
good.  Thus  misfortune  becomes  fortune ;  sorrow 
a  fountain  of  joy.  God  is  brought  into  our  sor- 
rows, an  infinite,  a  divine  help,  and  Helper. 

St.  Paul  grasped  this  divine  philosophy,  and 
learned  how  to  rejoice  over  persecution,  poverty, 
pain,  and  to  make  these  things  a  source  of  thanks- 
giving. Is  not  this  a  perfect  answer  to  the  needs 
of  man  in  a  world  of  misery  and  woe?  It  makes 
man  independent,  a  victor  over  adversity. 

Death  is  the  last  fact.  This  Christianity  has 
turned  into  life.  The  humblest  and  most  igno- 
rant Christian  knows  this,  and  he  simply  defies 
death.  His  mastery  of  the  king  of  terrors  is  com- 
plete. He  knows  that  death  has  been  conquered 
by  Christ,  that  he  is  powerless  to  hurt  the  soul. 
Yea,  that  he  has  become  our  humble  servant  to 
introduce  us  into  the  life  eternal.  It  means  the 
end  of  sorrow,  the  beginning  of  pure  unmixed 
bliss,  the  portal  of  glory,  and  the  introduction 
into  the  fellowship  of  his  Saviour,  and  the  society 
of  loved  ones,  "not  lost,  but  gone  before." 

Come  to  a  Christian's  deathbed.  Come,  bring 
something  better  than  what  the  Christian  already 


14        Will  the  World  Outgrow  Christianity 

has.  What  shall  it  be?  Can  you  add  anything  to 
his  comforts,  to  his  faith,  to  his  hope?  No;  the 
Christian  says,  "I  have  a  perfect  antidote  for 
death.     I  want  no  more." 

The  reason  Christianity  is  a  perfect  answer  to 
human  needs  is  because  He  who  made  man  and 
who  knows  him  absolutely  made  Christianity  for 
him,  a  perfect  remedy  for  sin,  sorrow,  death. 
What  God  has  done  for  His  children  cannot  be  set 
aside  by  a  better  thing.  Christianity  is  God  in 
sorrow,  pain  and  death.  Here  is  the  divine  fact 
that  outshines  all  other  remedies,  as  the  sun  out- 
shines our  poor  candles  which  glimmer  in  the 
night.  Men  had  candles  in  their  rooms,  but  they 
put  them  out  when  the  sun  arose.  Men  walked 
with  lanterns,  but  they  laid  them  aside  when  day 
came.  Will  man  ever  invent  anything  that  will 
supersede  the  sun?  No;  it  is  God's  sun,  and  a 
perfect  means  of  light.  So  Christianity  is  God's 
light,  it  can  never  be  outshone  by  any  candle  of 
man's  invention. 

All  history  proves  this :  man  has  always  come 
back  to  Christianity.  The  religions  of  the 
Greeks,  Romans,  Egyptians,  went  out,  and  they 
did  not  return.  But  since  God  gave  the  salvation 
by  Christ  to  our  first  parents  at  the  beginning  of 
sin,  sorrow  and  death,  it  has  held  its  own.  Men 
have  left  it  indeed ;  but  they  have  always  come 
back.  The  needs  of  the  soul,  the  miseries  of  life, 
unsatisfied  by  any  human  device,  have  always 
driven  them  back  to  God. 


Will  the  World  Outgrow  Christianity        15 

So  infidelity  has  always  been  a  failure.  Men 
who  could  not  answer  its  arguments  have  still 
held  to  their  faith.  Has  infidelity  given  anything 
better?  No.  It  has  given  nothing.  Its  effort  is 
simply  to  destroy,  and  human  wisdom  is  as  far 
from  giving  man  a  solace  for  his  woe  as  it  ever 
was.  It  has  given  literally  nothing.  It  has  tried 
to  put  out  the  light  when  it  had  no  other  light  to 
give.  "I  have  tasted  and  seen  that  the  Lord  is 
good,"  is  the  Christian's  answer  to  infidelity,  and 
he  stands  as  firm  as  the  rock  of  Gibraltar  against 
the  tide  and  storm. 


WILL   THE   BIBLE   LIVE 


«♦, 


HEAVEN    AND  EARTH    SHALL    PASS    AWAY,   BUT  MY 
WORDS  SHALL  NOT  PASS  AWAY." MATT.    24:  35. 

An  infidel  one  day,  in  a  quiet  moment,  said: 
"There  is  one  thing  that  mars  all  the  pleasures  of 
my  life. "  "What  is  that?"  asked  a  friend,  and 
the  answer  was,  "I  am  afraid  the  Bible  is  true, 
and  if  it  is  I  am  lost."  After  all  his  attempts  to 
prove  that  the  Bible  was  a  fraud,  he  feared  that 
his  labors  were  a  failure.  There  was  something 
in  his  own  soul  that  was  not  satisfied. 

We  have  attacks  on  the  Bible  from  infidels  and 
Christians.  Infidels  contend  that  the  Bible  is  a 
fiction,  a  lie,  and  some  Christians  delight  to  point 
out  what  they  consider  mistakes  in  the  Bible.  In 
former  days  an  apostate  church  declared  that  the 
Bible  was  "un  livre  mandit"  "a  cursed  book," 
and  forbade  men  to  read  it.  With  great  cere- 
mony the  same  church  has  burned  all  the  Bibles 
it  could  get  its  hands  on,  and  burned  men  and 
women  for  reading  the  Bible. 

Each  generation  answers  for  itself  the  question, 
"Is  the  Bible  true?"  and  the  most  prominent  of 
all  the  questions  of  the  present  hour  is,  "Will  the 
Bible  live?"  Will  it  survive  the  hostile  attacks  of 
infidels  and  false  Christians? 

16 


Will  the  Bible  Live  17 

In  attempting-  to  answer  this  question  we  pur- 
pose using  but  one  argument.  We  shall  not 
argue  from  the  fact  that  it  is  a  divine  book,  and 
that  God  is  pledged  to  maintain  it;  but  this  only 
— the  Bible  will  live  because  it  satisfies  man's  sonly 
and  the  exigencies  of  his  life  and  death.  It  is  the 
only  thing  that  meets  the  perennial  wants  of  man. 

In  ancient  times  there  was  a  remedy  used  as  an 
antidote  for  poison.  It  was  called  mithridate, 
because  it  was  said  to  have  been  made  by  Mithri- 
dates.  At  length  a  great  discussion  arose  among 
medical  people  as  to  whether  Mithridates  really 
invented  the  medicine,  but  the  people  said, 
"Never  mind  about  that,  we  shall  continue  to  use 
it  because  it  does  what  we  want. "  So  with  the 
Bible.  The  people  do  not  take  much  interest  in 
learned  discussions  about  the  Bible.  "It  satisfies 
their  longings  as  nothing  else  can  do." 

The  first  question  the  human  soul  asks  is  as  to 
the  origin  of  things.  Man  wakes  up  to  existence 
in  a  world  new  to  him  and  asks,  "  Whence  came 
what  I  see?  and  whence  came  It"  The  Bible  is 
the  only  answer  to  this  question.  No  other  an- 
swer has  ever  been  given.  Man  feels  instinctively 
that  the  universe  could  not  have  made  itself. 
He  searches  the  sea,  the  mountains,  plains  and 
sky  for  a  maker  of  things.  He  finds  nothing. 
He  discovers  no  supreme  architect  and  governor. 
Nowhere  does  he  see  his  glorious  dwelling  place. 
Yet  he  feels  there  must  be  a  maker  of  worlds 
and  of  men.     So  he  bows  down    to  worship  the 


18  Will  the  Bible  Live 

Unknown,  believing  that  though  unknown  He  is 
not  unknowable. 

After  all  his  thought  and  inquiry  he  feels,  how- 
ever, that  he  has  at  best  reached  only  a  prob- 
ability.    He  has  no  certainty  of  belief. 

Some  say  things  had  no  maker;  that  they 
always  were ;  but  this  satisfies  no  one.  Now  he 
opens  a  book,  the  oldest  of  books,  and  he  reads  in 
its  first  line,  "In  the  beginning  God  created  the 
heavens  and  the  earth. "  Here  is  what  he  sought 
— an  authoritative  statement,  and  he  believes  it 
for  two  reasons :  because  it  is  the  only  statement 
he  has  found  as  to  the  origin  of  things,  and  be- 
cause it  suits  the  facts  of  the  case  as  he  sees  them. 
He  discovers  traces  of  design,  an  eye  with  light 
for  it  to  see,  a  mouth  with  food  for  it  to  eat,  all 
things  made  in  one  harmonious  whole;  every- 
thing for  a  purpose,  and  each  thing  fitted  to  some 
other  thing.  He  feels  there  must  be  a  designer 
where  there  is  so  much  design.  So  he  says  the 
Bible  is  true  because  it  says  what  all  nature 
declares  to  be  true. 

The  great  geologist,  James  D.  Dana,  says: 
"The  order  of  events  in  the  Scripture  cosmogony 
corresponds  essentially  with  that  which  has  been 
given  (by  geology).  The  record  in  the  Bible  is 
therefore  profoundly  philosophical  in  the  scheme 
of  creation  which  it  presents.  It  is  both  true  and 
divine.  If  true  it  is  divine,  because  no  human 
mind  was  witness  of  the  events  (of  creation)." 

The  other  part  of    the  question  is,   "Whence 


Will  the  Bible  Live  19 

came  I?"  The  Bible  says:  "And  God  made  man 
in  His  own  image."  This  agrees  with  the  facts. 
Man  feels  himself  far  above  the  brute  creation, 
belonging  to  another  sphere,  and  that  he  is  allied 
to  divinity.  The  Bible  tells  him  he  is  God's  son. 
He  believes  the  Bible  because  his  own  soul  tells 
him  that  this  is  true.  False  science  will  never 
persuade  man  that  he  is  descended  from  proto- 
plasm and  anthropoid  apes.  He  is  conscious  of 
an  immortal  spirit  within  him,  and  he  claims  kin- 
ship from  the  eternal,  descent  from  God, 

Thus,  as  Sir  Isaac  Newton  said,  "The  Bible  is 
the  divine  philosophy." 

The  next  question  of  all  ages  and  races  is, 
" What  is  God?"  All  men  have  answered  this 
question  for  themselves,  and  yet  they  have  never 
been  satisfied  with  their  own  answers.  So  they 
have  gone  on  from  age  to  age  making  new 
answers,  making  new  gods.  The  gods  of  one 
age  have  never  satisfied  the  people  of  succeeding 
generations. 

The  Bible  gives  an  account  of  God  that  agrees 
with  the  facts  of  the  case,  and  satisfies  man's 
soul.  According  to  the  Bible  there  is  but  one 
God.  All  things  were  made  by  Him.  He  is  a 
Spirit,  infinite,  eternal,  self-existent,  and  al- 
mighty. He  is  a  God  whom  men  can  worship, 
or  at  least  fear. 

Now  nature  gives  great  hints  of  a  god  of  wis- 
dom and  power,  but  nature  does  not  prove  a  god 
of  mercy.     Rather  nature  shows  a  god  of  abso- 


20  Will  the  Bible  Live 

lute  and  inflexible  justice.  In  nature  no  violation 
of  laws  goes  unpunished.  Nature  is  absolutely 
inexorable.  Mercy  and  forgiveness  are  unknown 
in  the  processes  of  the  natural  world. 

The  Bible  shows  a  God  of  love,  and  says,  "God 
so  loved  the  world  that  He  gave  His  only-begot- 
ten Son  that  whosoever  believeth  on  Him  should 
not  perish,  but  have  everlasting  life."  Here  is  a 
philosophy  of  God — a  theology  far  beyond  and 
above  the  philosophy  of  nature.  Yet  it  meets  the 
wants  of  man's  soul.  Man  feels  himself  a  son  of 
God,  that  God  is  his  father,  and  that  a  father 
loves  his  children.  But  against  that  stands  the 
awful  fact  of  sin  and  punishment.  How  God  can 
be  just  and  forgive  a  sinner  is  a  problem  that 
nature  has  never  solved.  The  Bible  solves  it,  and 
there  we  learn  that  the  Creator  became  man  and 
bore  man's  guilt  that  man  might  be  saved.  This 
is  the  sublimest  fact  known  to  mortals,  and  man 
will  never  give  up  the  book  that  tells  him  this 
glorious  news. 

The  Gospel  of  the  Bible  alone  shows  man  how  to 
be  saved.  Nature  has  many  paths,  but  none  of 
them  lead  to  the  cross.  The  Bible  tells  man  he 
is  a  sinner;  he  knows  that  already,  but  the  Bible 
tells  him  God  is  a  Saviour — that  is  news  indeed. 

This  Gospel  proves  to  be  the  thing  his  soul 
needed.  All  its  statements  correspond  with  the 
facts  of  the  case,  and  the  wants  of  man's  soul. 
//  satisfies  him,  and  therefore  he  believes  it.  It 
is  like  air  for  his  lungs,  and  water  for  his  mouth. 


Will  the  Bible  Live  21 

He  feels  that  these  are  the  things  he  needs,  and 
must  have.  The  man  suffocating  in  a  mine  which 
is  filled  with  poisonous  gases,  when  he  comes  up 
to  the  air  breathes  it  in,  and  is  satisfied.  The 
famishing  traveler  in  the  desert  comes  to  an 
oasis,  and  he  stoops  down  and  drinks,  and  is 
satisfied.  So  the  panting,  famishing  soul  receives 
the  Gospel,  it  satisfies  him,  and  he  believes  it. 
This  after  all  is  the  best  of  all  proofs  that  the 
Bible  will  live.  The  Bible  will  live  as  long  as  it 
satisfies  man's  soul,  and  it  will  as  long  as  man's 
soul  cries  out  for  God,  for  pardon,  and  eternal 
life. 

Man  finds  in  the  Bible  a  perfect  picture  of  him- 
self taken  before  he  was  born.  An  African  heard 
the  first  chapter  of  Romans  read,  and  he  said: 
"Missionary,  you  said  this  book  was  finished 
two  thousand  years  ago;  but  that  chapter  shows 
me  myself,"  and  he  feels  that  God  wrote  it.  A 
dying  soldier  heard  the  parable  of  the  prodigal 
son  read,  and  he  cried  out:  "That's  me!  that's 
me!"  and  so  it  was,  for  he  who  knows  all  prodi- 
gals wrote  it  that  every  prodigal  might  find  him- 
self in  it  and  find  God. 

The  only  solution  of  the  mysteries  and  diffi- 
culties of  human  life  is  found  here.  How  can 
man  suffer  so,  and  yet  there  be  a  God  almighty? 
The  Bible  shows  us  the  cross  of  the  God-man,  and 
we  feel  that  whatever  mystery  there  may  be,  yet 
God  is  love,  and  men  bear  suffering  patiently,  and 
hope  even  in  death. 


22  Will  the  Bible  Live 

What  can  reconcile  the  rich  and  the  poor?  The 
Bible  commands  every  man  to  love  his  neighbor 
as  himself — the  poor  to  love  the  rich,  and  the  rich 
to  love  the  poor — and  this  is  the  solution  of  all 
questions  of  sociology  concerning  the  classes 
and  the  masses,  that  every  man  shall  love  his 
neighbor  as  himself.  It  shows  God,  who  "was 
rich,  for  our  sakes  becoming  poor,  that  we 
through  His  poverty  might  be  rich,"  and  calls  on 
men  to  follow  His  example,  every  man  serv- 
ing his  fellow  man  under  a  universal  law  of 
love. 

The  Bible  alone  enables  a  man  to  die  in  perfect 
peace.  It  lifts  enough  the  veil  of  the  future  to 
show  man  an  eternal  city,  where  no  sin  nor  sor- 
row ever  can  come :  a  home  for  all  who  trust  in 
Jesus ;  a  place  of  glad  reunions  and  no  farewells. 
It  is  the  only  book  that  gives  any  positive  knowl- 
edge of  the  future  beyond  death. 

We  have  seen  many  die  in  peace,  perfect 
peace,  depending  upon  the  Bible  story.  The 
Bible  has  proven  sufficient  for  this  greatest 
strain,  and  we  have  never  seen  it  fail.  Not  one 
of  all  the  millions  who  have  tried  it  have  said  that 
it  failed  at  the  last.  On  the  contrary,  they  have 
said  it  satisfied  them  perfectly,  that  death  was  not 
death  to  them,  but  victory,  and  the  gate  to  glory. 
Men  will  never  give  up  a  book  that  can  do 
this. 

The  poor  man  finds  comfort  in  his  poverty;  the 
tempted  find  strength  to  overcome ;  the  penitent 


Will  the  Bible  Live  23 

finds  peace  of  conscience ;  the  bereaved  find  con- 
solation in  distress ;  the  dying  find  the  antidote 
of  death. 

So  the  child  will  go  on  reading  his  Bible  be- 
cause it  tells  who  made  him  and  all  things,  and 
men  and  women  will  go  on  reading  the  Bible 
because  it  meets  the  wants  of  their  souls  in  every 
trial  of  life.  "If  you  take  away  my  Bible  what 
have  you  to  give  me  instead?  Nothing?  Well, 
I  will  keep  my  Bible,  if  you  please.  I  recognize 
in  it  the  voice  of  God  speaking  to  my  soul." 

So  we  say  the  Bible  stands  not  on  the  authority 
of  any  church,  but  on  the  authority  of  its  own 
majestic  fitness  for  the  wants  of  man.  Men  will 
never  reject  it  so  long  as  they  have  sins  to  be  for- 
given, souls  to  save,  and  great  questionings  of 
time  and  eternity,  life  and  death,  to  answer. 

Looking  back  over  the  millenniums  past  we  see 
that  all  that  is  best,  holiest  and  most  beneficent 
in  the  story  of  humanity  comes  from  the  Bible. 
It  has  constantly  been  attacked,  yet  it  still  holds 
its  glorious  place  in  the  affection  and  faith  of 
men. 

Now  and  again  some  wiseacre  rises  up  and 
declares  with  great  solemnity  that  the  Bible  is  a 
book  for  children  and  old  women,  and  it  will  soon 
be  a  dead  book.  But  men  go  on  reading  their 
Bibles  just  the  same,  and  printing  more  Bibles  all 
the  time. 

To-day  it  is  printed  in  400  languages,  and  dur- 
ing the  century   now  just  closed  270,000,000  of 


24  Will  the  Bible  Live 

volumes  of  Scripture  were  published,  more  than 
enough  to  make  a  girdle  for  the  world,  and  they 
are  being  issued  now  at  the  rate  of  over  6,000,000 
per  year!  Will  the  Bible  live?  "Heaven  and 
earth  shall  pass  away,  but  my  worlds  shall  not 
pass  away. ' ' 


WILL  MEN  CONTINUE  TO  BELIEVE 
IN  GOD 

"thou  HAST  BESET  ME  BEHIND  AND  BEFORE,  AND 
LAID  THINE  HAND  UPON  ME."  " WHITHER  SHALL  I 
FLEE  FROM  THY  PRESENCE?" PS.    139:5,    7- 

The  real  animus  and  design  of  most  attacks  on 
the  Bible,  on  Christianity,  and  on  the  historic  doc- 
trines of  the  church,  is  to  get  rid  of  God.  Not 
all  who  make  these  attacks  are  conscious  of  what 
their  efforts  mean,  that  they  are  moved  by  hostil- 
ity to  God.  Who  is  behind  this  feeling,  and  who 
inspires  these  attacks,  is  a  question  the  answer  to 
which  would  offend  their  authors.  It  is  one 
whom  they  are  altogether  unwilling  to  acknowl- 
edge that  they  serve. 

Not  only  do  infidels  fight  against  God,  but  all 
who  attempt  to  destroy  His  Word  and  His  church. 
Many  attacks  are  being  made  upon  the  beliefs  of 
Christendom.  Will  men  continue  to  believe  in 
God?  We  unhesitatingly  affirm  that  they  will; 
that  men  always  will  believe  in  God  because  they 
can't  help  it;  because  the  greatest  questions  of 
the  mind  cannot  be  answered  without  this  belief. 
In  other  words,  men  will  believe  in  God  because 
it  is  easier  to  believe  than  not  to  believe  in  Him. 

25 


26  Will  Men  Continue  to  Believe  in  God 

The  first  reason  why  men  will  believe  in  God 
in  the  future  is  because  they  have  always  believed 
in  Him  in  the  past. 

For  thousands  of  years  infidels  have  tried  to 
destroy  the  world's  belief  in  God.  Satan  began 
it  in  the  first  temptation,  offered  to  Adam  and 
Eve  in  the  Garden  of  Eden.  Satan  induced  the 
first  pair  to  act  as  if  there  were  no  God,  but  they 
went  to  work  immediately  to  make  fig-leaf  aprons 
to  hide  their  nakedness  from  God.  Men  have 
been  doing  these  things  ever  since,  first  denying 
God,  and  then  going  to  work  to  make  some  sort 
of  silly  preparation  to  meet  Him. 

The  point  is  this,  that  for  six  thousand  years 
the  attempt  has  been  constantly  made  to  persuade 
men  that  there  is  no  God,  and  men  have  gone  on 
all  the  time  getting  some  sort  of  preparation  to 
meet  God.  They  have  continued  to  build  tem- 
ples, continued  to  bow  down  and  worship.  At- 
tacks on  God  have  never  kept  the  knees  of  the 
mass  of  men  stiff.  They  bend  in  worship  in  spite 
of  infidelity  and  the  devil.  If  infidelity  has  not 
succeeded  in  six  thousand  years  past,  there  is  no 
reason  to  expect  that  it  will  succeed  in  six  thou- 
sand years  to  come,  in  persuading  men  that  there 
is  no  God. 

Another  reason  is  that  man  has  an  instinct  for 
God,  just  as  a  young  squirrel  has  for  building  a 
house  for  winter,  when  he  never  saw  a  winter, 
this  being  his  first  year  on  earth;  just  as  a  young 
wild  goose  has  for  flying  south  in  autumn,  when 


Will  Men  Continue  to  Believe  in  God        27 

he  never  saw  an  autumn  before,  now  knows  what 
winter  means. 

He  who  made  squirrels  and  geese,  made  man, 
and  gave  him  an  instinct  for  God.  He  can  no 
more  get  rid  of  this  instinct  than  the  squirrel  and 
goose  can  get  rid  of  their  instinct.  It  is  a  part  of 
their  constitution.  A  new-born  infant  turns  to 
its  mother's  breast  to  draw  therefrom  its  life- 
nourishment.  No  one  teaches  the  infant  this. 
He  who  made  the  infant  made  it  that  way.  So 
He  who  made  man  made  him  with  an  instinct  for 
Himself,  and  in  the  hour  of  extreme  trial,  if  not 
before,  he  cries  out  for  God.  Sin  has  blunted 
and  blurred  his  visional  instinct,  so  that  his  con- 
ceptions of  God  are  crude  and  indistinct,  but  sin 
has  not  destroyed  this  instinct.  He  is  like  a  man 
with  a  cataract  over  his  eyes.  He  cannot  see 
things,  yet  he  can  tell  when  day  comes;  he  can 
see  enough  to  know  that  there  is  a  sun. 

So,  as  long  as  squirrels  and  geese  get  ready 
each  in  their  own  way  for  winter,  so  long  as  an 
infant  turns  to  its  mother's  breast,  so  long  will 
the  soul  cry  out,  "God,  O  God,"  just  because  it 
can't  help  it. 

Then  every  man  is  a  philosopher,  whether  he 
knows  it  or  not.  A  philosopher  is  a  man  who 
seeks  to  know  the  reasons  for  things.  He  sees  a 
thing  and  he  asks  how  it  came  about,  what  its 
nature  is,  and  what  it  was  meant  for. 

Man  looks  about  him,  and  he  sees  many  things. 
He  knows  he  did  not  make  them,  so  he  asks, 


28         Will  Men  Continue  to  Believe  in  God 

"Who  did?"  When  you  tell  him  they  made 
themselves,  he  replies,  <4I  am  not  a  fool;  I  never 
knew  anything  to  make  itself.  To  do  that  it 
would  have  to  be  before  it  was. "  He  sees  a  ship, 
he  says  a  man  made  that,  and  a  great  man,  for  it 
is  a  great  thing.  He  sees  an  apple  tree  full  of 
fruit,  and  ht,  says  some  great  one  made  that,  for 
it  is  wonderful  thing.  He  sees  a  gnat,  and  he 
says,  "Some  great  one  made  that,  for  it  is  a  great 
thing.  I  can't  make  a  gnat,  and  the  man  who 
built  the  ship  can't  make  a  gnat.  I  see  many 
things,  and  of  most  things  I  know  that  man  did 
not  make  them,  nor  did  they  make  themselves. 
So  there  must  be  a  Maker  greater  than  man." 
Therefore,  as  long  as  there  are  apple  trees  and 
gnats,  men  will  believe  in  a  Maker  far  above  man 
— that  is,  in  a  God. 

When  he  looks  from  a  mountain  top  upon  a 
wide  horizon,  from  the  seashore  upon  the  vast 
sea,  from  his  doorstep  into  the  limitless  sky,  with 
its  uncounted  stars,  he  says:  "There  must  be  a 
limitless  Maker,  an  Infinite  One,  call  Him  what 
you  please;  as  for  me,  I  choose  to  call  Him 
God." 

Therefore,  as  long  as  man  has  an  eye  to  see 
things,  and  a  few  grains  of  sense,  he  will  say, 
"God,  O  God!" 

Now  infidelity  comes  and  says,  "There  is  no 
God."  This  is  a  denial  simply,  not  an  affirma- 
tion. It  takes  away,  but  gives  nothing.  This  is 
the  weakness  of  infidelity.     It  offers  man  nothing 


Will  Men  Continue  to  Believe  in  God         29 

in  place  of  what  it  tries  to  take  away.  The  mind 
will  never  be  satisfied  with  mere  denials.  It 
abhors  a  vacuum.  Man  says,  "Well,  if  God  did 
not  make  things,  who  did?"  and  infidelity  says, 
"We  don't  know;  we  are  agnostics — know-noth- 
ings." And  man  replies,  "Well,  if  you  don't 
know  anything,  how  can  you  teach  me  anything? 
and  I  am  going  to  believe  God  made  things  until 
you  show  me  that  some  one  else  made  them." 
So  in  nature  God  besets  man  behind  and  before. 
The  untutored  Indian  looks  about  him  and  above 
him,  and  bows  down  to  worship  the  "Great 
Spirit,"  and  when  he  thinks  of  death  he  prays  to 
be  carried  to  the  happy  hunting  grounds.  There 
is  a  good  deal  of  theology  in  that. 

There  is  something  also  beside  the  creation  of 
things  that  forces  man  to  believe  in  God.  It  is 
Jiuma?i  life.  "Thou  hast  laid  thine  hand  upon 
me."  Here  is  a  mystery  that  infidelity  has  not 
solved. 

I  constantly  find  some  one  stronger  than  I 
doing  something  with  me.  I  start  out  in  a  ship 
to  reach  a  certain  port,  and  do  all  I  can  to  reach 
that  port,  but  at  the  end  of  my  voyage  I  find 
myself  somewhere  else.  Who  sent  me  there?  I 
didn't.  No  man  did;  who  did?  The  winds  did 
it.  Who  made  the  winds  to  blow  just  that  par- 
ticular way,  at  that  particular  time?  I  didn't; 
who  did?  The  Pilgrim  fathers  sailed  from  Plym- 
outh for  Hampton  Roads,  but  they  landed  on 
the  shore  of  Massachusetts;    who  did  it?      The 


30         Will  Men  Continue  to  Believe  in  God 

only  rational  answer,  the  only  answer  that  men 
will  accept  as  sufficient,  is  God!  The  only  answer 
to  the  things  that  happen  all  over  the  earth,  in 
the  lives  of  men  and  nations,  is  God. 

Is  there  a  man  here  who  can  say,  "My  life  is 
just  what  I  intended  to  make  it"?  No;  you 
know  it  is  not.  Why  is  it  not?  Some  one  has 
been  meddling  with  your  life  all  the  time,  and 
setting  your  way  aside;  who  is  this  meddler? 
Men  know  very  well  who  it  is,  and  so,  when  they 
want  things  very  much,  or  when  they  think  a 
great  trouble  is  coming,  they  get  down  on  their 
knees* and  say,  "God,  O  God!"  They  always  do 
it,  on  land  or  sea ;  at  sick-beds,  on  battle-fields, 
and  at  the  hour  of  death. 

By  the  way,  do  you  know  when  you  are  going 
to  die?  No;  why?  Because  some  one  else  settles 
that  question  for  you.     Who  is  it? 

But  the  argument  is  not  all  drawn  from  disap- 
pointments and  disasters.  We  Christians  dwell 
too  much  on  that  side  of  the  argument.  We  are 
too  apt  to  call  providences,  that  is,  things  that 
God  does,  those  things  only  that  hurt  or  scare  us. 
A  man  said,  "Oh,  I  have  had  such  a  providence; 
my  train  ran  off  the  track  yesterday,  and  many 
were  killed,  but  I  escaped  by  a  special  provi- 
dence," and  it  was  true.  But  his  friend  replied, 
"I  also  had  a  special  providence  yesterday;  my 
train  did  not  run  off  the  track."  It  is  a  provi- 
dence when  a  baby  dies,  and  we  solemnly  say, 
"God's  will  be  done" ;  but  it  is  also  a  providence 


Will  Men  Continue  to  Believe  in  God         31 

when  a  baby  does  not  die,  nor  even  get  sick,  but 
laughs  in  its  crib,  and  sucks  its  thumb  content- 
edly. Providence  is  in  every  sunny  day,  every 
fair  flower,  every  singing  bird,  every  laughing 
child,  every  well-laden  apple  tree,  every  harvest 
field,  everything  in  earth  or  sky,  and  every 
moment  of  time. 

Would  not  this  be  a  lonely  world  without  God? 
I  should  feel  that  I  was  an  orphan,  and  sit  down 
and  cry.  The  loneliest  thought  a  man  can  have 
is  to  be  in  a  wide  universe  where  there  is  no  God. 

But  certain  so-called  theologians  say,  "Oh,  yes, 
there  is  a  God,  but  He  hasn't  much  to  do  with 
things."  I  answer,  "Why  hasn't  He?  Doesn't 
He  care  what  happens  to  the  things  He  has 
made?  I  don't  believe  it;  it  wouldn't  be  so  with 
me.  If  I  plant  a  garden,  I  take  care  of  it.  If 
God  made  a  world,  He  will  take  care  of  that." 

There  are  but  two  ways  of  looking  at  things : 
either  God  made  them  with  certain  laws,  and  left 
them  like  a  machine  to  grind  on  and  out,  or  else 
God  has  a  hand  in  all  that  comes  to  pass.  Men 
will  always  believe  the  latter  because  it  seems  to 
them  more  reasonable. 

Well,  if  God  has  a  hand  in  things,  when  did  He 
make  up  His  mind  to  do  the  things  He  does? 
When?  from  all  eternity,  because  He  always 
knew;  He  was  always  God.  I  always  make  up 
my  mind  what  to  do  as  far  ahead  as  I  can  see,  and 
any  intelligent  person  will.  I  see  a  little  way; 
God  sees  all  the  way.     To  say  that  God  does  not 


32         Will  Men  Continue  to  Believe  in  God 

have  a  hand  in  things,  and  did  not  know  from 
eternity  what  He  would  do,  is  to  say  He  isn't  God. 
I  prefer  to  believe  that  He  knows  all  things,  and 
has  always  known  what  He  would  do,  because  it  is 
more  comfortable  to  believe  that  way.  It  makes 
it  easier  for  me  to  live,  and  easier  for  me  to  die. 
This  is  the  feeling  of  mankind,  and  always  will 
be.  They  believe  in  God  because  there  is  no  one 
else  to  believe  in.  We  want  an  almighty,  all- 
knowing  God,  and  when  we  read  in  the  Bible  that 
He  is  Love  then  we  say,  "I  could  not  have  a 
better  God.  He  suits  me  because  this  accounts 
for  all  I  see,  and  all  I  feel,  and  fills  my  soul  with 
rest."  St.  Augustine  said,  "The  soul  was  made 
for  God,  and  can  never  rest  until  it  rests  in  Him. " 

In  heaven  all  believe  in  God,  and  in  hell  all 
believe  in  God.  It  is  only  on  earth  that  you  find 
an  occasional  man  who  says,  "There  is  no  God," 
and  the  Bible  declares  he  is  a  "fool."  And  the 
mass  of  mankind  will  say,  "Yes,  that  is  true." 
"The  fool  hath  said  in  his  heart,  There  is  no 
God."  But  no  man  is  fool  enough  to  say  this  in 
the  hour  of  death,  and  the  infidel  passes  out  of 
this  world  crying,  "God,  have  mercy  on  my 
soul!"  The  Christian  dies  saying,  "Father,  into 
Thy  hands  I  commend  my  spirit. "  "O  Death, 
where  is  thy  sting?  O  Grave,  where  is  thy  vic- 
tory?" "Thanks  be  unto  God  which  giveth  us 
the  victory  through  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ. ' ' 

The  Christian  believes  in  God  also  because  he 
has  spoken  to  Him  often  and  gotten  answers  back. 


Will  Men  Continue  to  Believe  in  God        33 

He  has  asked  for  the  forgiveness  of  sins,  and  has 
received  it.  The  God  of  Love  whom  he  has  not 
seen  has  pardoned  his  sins,  and  he  knows  it, 
because  he  has  peace.  He  has  asked  God  to  help 
him  in  trouble,  and  He  has  done  it.  If  He  did  not 
avert  the  disaster,  He  gave  him  grace  to  bear  it, 
and  to  be  its  conqueror.  In  a  thousand  ways, 
day  by  day,  he  has  had  communication  with  God. 
You  cannot  persuade  him  to  disbelieve  in  an  old 
Friend. 

So  men  will  go  on  believing  in  God  and  saying, 
"Thou  hast  beset  me  behind,  and  before,  and  laid 
Thine  hand  upon  me." 


HOW  SHALL  WE  PRAY  THAT  OUR 
PRAYERS  MAY  BE  ANSWERED 

"the  effectual  fervent  prayer  of  a  righteous 
man  availeth  much." james  5:  16. 

The  only  way  to  answer  a  question  like  this  is 
from  the  inspired  Word. 

When  we  read  that  "whatsoever  ye  ask,  believ- 
ing, ye  shall  receive,"  we  understand  that  our 
request  must  be  reasonable,  and  according  to 
God's  will.  It  would  be  absurd  to  expect  any 
foolish  prayer  to  be  answered.  Suppose  I  ask 
God  to  send  a  snowstorm  in  July,  or  to  turn  the 
current  of  the  Mississippi  backward,  or  to  enable 
me  to  commit  sin  with  immunity  from  punish- 
ment; of  course  God  will  not  grant  my  petition. 
"Prayer  is  the  offering  of  our  desires  unto  God, 
for  things  agreeable  to  His  will,  in  the  name  of 
Christ,  with  confession  of  sin,  and  thankful 
acknowledgment  of  His  mercies."  Two  prin- 
ciples enter  into  the  question  of  answers  to 
prayer:  (i)  Whether  the  things  asked  for  are 
agreeable  to  God's  will,  and  (2)  the  matter  of 
time;  He  does  not  promise  to  always  give  the 
answer  at  once.  But,  allowing  all  proper  dis- 
count on  our  prayers  in  the  light  of  these  two 
limitations,  still  there  remains  often  a  great  dis- 

34 


How  Shall  We  Pray  35 

appointment  in  prayer,  for  many  of  our  prayers, 
even  for  things  we  know  are  according  to  God's 
will,  are  never  answered.  "We  ask  and  receive 
not,  because  we  ask  amiss,"  and  that  is  perfectly 
natural  and  to  be  expected ;  for  God  will  not  give 
tilings  which  we  ought  not  to  have.  We  ask  for 
temporal  gifts  from  a  wrong  motive,  "that  we  may 
consume  them  upon  our  lusts. "  Such  prayers  must 
go  unanswered.  But  when  we  pray  for  the  conver- 
sion of  a  friend,  or  for  the  outpouring  of  the  Holy 
Spirit,  upon  the  church  we  know  that  we  are  ask- 
ing for  things  agreeable  to  God's  will.  Now 
when  we  pray  thus  and  for  weary  years  without 
receiving  an  answer,  we  become  discouraged,  and 
our  prayers  instead  of  being  a  comfort  become 
the  occasion  of  great  distress  of  mind.  We 
begin,  at  length,  to  doubt  and  to  say,  perhaps  I 
am  not  heard  because  I  am  not  a  Christian,  or 
perhaps  there  is  no  God. 

One  of  the  most  pressing  of  all  questions  is, 
"How  shall  we  pray,  that  our  prayers  may  be 
answered?"  for  we  feel  that  the  fault  is  not  in 
God,  but  in  ourselves.  God  has  said,  "Ask  and 
ye  shall  receive,"  and  therefore  we  conclude  that 
if  our  prayers  are  not  answered  we  have  not 
truly  asked,  for  if  the  Bible  is  to  be  believed, 
every  true  prayer  is  answered.  God  may  not 
indeed  answer  just  as  we  expect,  but  answer  He 
will  in  His  own  wise  way,  and  at  the  right  time. 
What  kind  of  a  prayer  is  answered? 

It    is    "the    effectual"    prayer.      What    does 


36  Hozu  Shall  We  Pray  that 

effectual  mean?  It  means  producing  effects. 
The  prayer  that  produces  effects  is  answered. 
Effects  upon  whom?  Upon  God?  No;  for  that 
would  be  mere  repetition  of  the  same  idea,  a  talk- 
ing in  a  circle.  It  would  be  equivalent  to  saying, 
"The  prayer  that  produces  effects  upon  God  pro- 
duces effects  upon  God."  It  is  the  prayer  that 
produces  effects  upon  him  who  offers  it,  that 
"availeth  much"  or  produces  effects  upon  God. 
Action  and  reaction  are  equal ;  and  the  bowstring 
that  is  to  send  an  arrow  far  must  be  drawn  far 
back  by  the  hand  of  the  bowman.  The  prayer 
that  is  to  ascend  to  heaven  must  be  sent  by  a 
force  in  the  heart,  and  the  heart  must  be  strained 
to  send  it  up  to  God. 

What  effect  should  the  availing  prayer  have 
upon  the  offerer?  It  must  have  the  effect  of  mak- 
ing him  strive  after  the  thing  he  prays  for,  that 
God  may  use  him  as  the  means  of  securing  the 
answer.  There  is  nothing  mysterious  about  this. 
A  farmer  who  prays  for  a  good  crop  must  sow  his 
seed,  and  plow  his  corn.  That  is  his  part,  the 
necessary  effect  of  the  prayer  upon  the  farmer. 
If  God  answers  his  prayer  it  will  be  by  making 
the  farmer's  labors  efficacious  by  a  blessing  upon 
his  toil.  The  same  rule  holds  in  spiritual  things. 
If  a  man  asks  God  to  make  him  a  better  Chris- 
tian, he  must  strive  to  be  a  better  Christian.  He 
must  use  the  means  of  grace,  must  keep  good 
company,  study  the  Scriptures,  frequent  the 
house  of  worship,  avoid  evil  companionship,  and 


Our  Prayers  May  Be  Answered  37 

try  to  do  good.  This  is  the  effect  of  the  effectual 
prayer,  and  the  answer  will  come  through  God's 
blessing  upon  the  effort  the  Christian  makes  to 
be  a  better  man.  If  he  prays  for  the  conversion 
of  a  friend,  he  must  seek  to  bring  his  friend  to 
God,  must  tell  him  of  his  need,  his  danger,  and 
his  opportunity.  He  need  not  speak  with  the 
eloquence  of  a  Chrysostom,  but  speak  he  must. 
"Let  him  that  heareth  say  come. "  You  pray  for  a 
man's  conversion  and  speak  to  him  on  every  sub- 
ject under  the  sun  except  that  of  his  soul's  salva- 
tion. This  shows  that  you  were  not  much  in 
earnest  or  concerned  about  the  man's  conversion. 
"Out  of  the  abundance  of  the  heart  the  mouth 
speaketh. "  Your  friend  was  not  converted  be- 
cause the  prayer  was  not  effectual,  and  it  produced 
no  effect  upon  you.  God  uses  means  to  answer 
your  prayer;  what  means?  Yourself.  Go  and 
urge  your  friend  to  come  to  Christ;  tell  him  you 
are  praying  for  him,  that  the  Saviour  died  for  his 
soul ;  help  him  to  get  over  his  doubts  and  diffi- 
culties, and  "bring  him  to  Jesus."  Then  you 
will  be  a  co-worker  with  God,  the  instrument  in 
His  hand  for  the  salvation  of  a  soul. 

Very  often  disappointed,  dejected  Christians 
come  and  tell  me  they  have  no  comfort  in  their 
religion,  their  prayers  are  not  answered.  My 
reply  is  to  ask,  "What  are  you  doing?"  and  the 
answer  is,  "Nothing."  Then  I  say,  "Do  some- 
thing, and  you  will  get  something.  Do  some- 
thing for   yourself  and   your    fellow    man,   and 


38  How  Shall  We  Pray  that 

God  will  answer  your  prayers,  and  grant  you 
that  peace  which  is  the  reward  of  service." 
My  prescription  is  to  send  them  to  visit  some 
poor  family  with  directions  to  help  them  in 
their  sorrows  and  trials;  and  if  they  do  this 
the)''  always  come  back  with  a  cheerful  face 
and  a  glad  heart.  I  have  tried  this  treatment 
many  a  time,  and  have  never  known  it  to  fail.  It 
is  merely  making  prayer  have  an  effect  upon 
the  offerer,  that  it  may  then  4'  avail  much  with 
God." 

The  next  element  of  success  in  prayer  is  that  it 
be  "fervent."  That  means,  burning.  Cold 
prayers  do  not  avail.  There  must  be  a  fire  in  the 
soul.  How  cold  are  many  of  our  prayers!  Did 
you  ever  fall  asleep  on  your  knees?  You  were 
before  the  throne  of  God  asking  for  transcendent 
gifts,  and  you  were  not  enough  interested  to  keep 
awake.  How  often  we  repeat  a  form  of  words 
with  no  feeling,  nor  even  thought  of  what  we  are 
saying.  Our  minds  wander  like  the  fool's  eyes, 
all  over  the  earth.  This  prayer  is  like  that  of 
the  Hindoo  who  writes  his  petition  upon  the  rim 
of  a  water  wheel,  and  leaving  his  machine  to  pray 
for  him,  goes  about  his  business.  God  will  not 
hear  the  petitions  of  a  praying  machine,  whether 
it  be  a  water  wheel  or  a  human  soul.  We  must 
mean  and  feel  what  we  say.  There  must  be  a 
flame  kindled  in  the  soul. 

Once  I  sought  a  pardon  for  a  man  condemned 
to  three  years  in  prison,  and  I  prepared  an  argu- 


Our  Prayers  May  Be  Answered  39 

ment  to  show  the  governor  that  the  man  ought  to 
be  set  free.  I  urged  my  reasons  with  all  my 
might,  and  the  governor  was  evidently  impressed, 
but  I  had  a  better  pleader  at  hand.  I  bade  the 
prisoner's  wife  to  speak,  and  she  did  with  her 
soul  in  her  lips  and  eyes.  She  was  offering  a 
fervent,  a  burning  prayer,  as  was  shown  by  the 
tears  rolling  down  her  cheeks.  When  she  had 
finished  the  governor  reached  for  a  handkerchief 
to  wipe  his  eyes,  and  then  wrote  the  words  that 
set  the  prisoner  free.  That  is  the  way  to  ask  God 
for  the  things  He  has  to  give.  Fervency  attests 
our  sincerity,  honors  God  and  brings  an  answer. 
Jacob  prayed  thus  at  Bethel.  He  wrestled  with 
God,  saying,  "I  will  not  let  Thee  go,  until  Thou 
bless  me,"  and  his  prayer  availed  and  pre- 
vailed. 

Our  prayer  must  be  fervent  enough  also  to 
make  us  persevere.  God  does  not  promise  to 
grant  our  petition  at  once.  For  His  own  wise 
reasons  He  often  delays  the  answer.  Perhaps  it 
is  to  try  our  faith,  or  to  keep  us  begging  at  His 
gate.  Christ  gives  a  model  in  the  case  of  the 
widow  who  kept  coming  to  the  "unjust  judge," 
until  he  granted  her  petition,  as  he  said,  "lest 
she  weary  me. ' ' 

A  man  came  to  me  on  a  Sunday  night  after 
service,  to  say  that  he  was  repentant  and  giving 
his  heart  to  God,  and  said,  "This  is  in  answer  to 
my  mother's  prayers."  "Where  is  your  mother?" 
I  asked;   and  he  answered,  "She  has  been  dead 


40  How  Shall  We  Pray  that 

sixteen  years."  Then  he  asked,  "Do  you  think 
she  knows  about  it  to-night?"  I  could  only 
reply,  "I  hope  so,  but  if  she  doesn't  now,  she  will 
when  she  meets  you  in  heaven." 

One  part  of  this  text  troubled  me  very  much  at 
one  time.  It  was  the  phrase,  "of  a  righteous 
man."  "Ah,"  I  said,  "that  is  the  reason  my 
prayers  are  not  answered;  I  am  not  a  'righteous 
man';  I  am  not  good  enough  to  pray."  I  had 
heard  ministers  tell  men  that  they  had  no  right 
to  pray  until  they  were  converted.  This  is  all 
wrong ;  it  is  the  right  and  duty  of  every  poor  sin- 
ner to  pray.  God  is  his  Father,  and  wants  to 
hear  his  voice  in  humble  supplication.  Now, 
when  we  understand  what  the  Scriptures  mean 
by  "a  righteous  man"  we  shall  not  be  hindered, 
but  encouraged  to  pray.  There  is  a  difference 
between  righteousness  and  holiness.  Of  course  a 
righteous  man  will  have  some  holiness;  but  a 
man  may  be  imperfectly  holy  and  perfectly  right- 
eous. Holiness  is  the  resemblance  of  our  char- 
acter to  God ;  to  be  righteous  is  to  be  pardoned, 
and  justified  through  faith.  The  righteous  man 
is  the  man  who  has  faith.  "Abraham  believed 
God,  and  it  was  accounted  to  him  for  righteous- 
ness."  This  is  a  thing  God  gives  men  if  they 
believe  in  Him,  and  the  righteousness  of  faith  is 
a  perfect  dress,  Christ's  own  robe,  in  which  we 
are  clothed  by  His  abounding  grace. 

Let  us  see  whose  prayers,  in  the  Bible,  were 
answered,  and  we  shall  know  who  were  righteous 


Our  Prayers  May  Be  Ansivered  41 

men.  We  will  take  extreme  cases,  because  they 
are  most  encouraging  to  us  poor  sinners.  A 
publican  went  up  into  the  Temple  to  pray, 
and  he  said,  standing  afar  off,  feeling  his  un- 
worthiness,  "God  be  merciful  to  me  a  sinner!" 
That  man's  prayer  was  heard;  it  availed  much 
with  God;  so  he  was  a  righteous  man;  for 
Christ  said,  "He  went  down  to  his  house  justi- 
fied." On  a  cross  beside  Christ,  on  Calvary, 
a  malefactor  hung  dying,  and  he  said  to 
Jesus,  "Lord,  remember  me  when  Thou  comest 
into  Thy  kingdom ! ' '  Christ  answered  his  prayer, 
and  said,  "To-day  shalt  thou  be  with  me  in 
paradise."  So  here  was  another  "righteous 
man."  It  all  goes  to  show  that  when  we  pray 
we  stand  not  on  the  merit  of  our  good  works,  but 
on  our  faith.  The  malefactor  believed  that  Jesus 
was  the  King  of  both  worlds,  for  he  asked  Him, 
in  this  world,  for  a  blessing  in  the  next.  Such 
faith  never  goes  unrewarded,  for  it  crowns  the 
Saviour  King  of  kings.  The  prayer  of  faith  is 
based  upon  belief  in  a  Christ  immortal  and 
divine.  It  reaches  for  eternal  glories.  "It  is  the 
swinging  of  the  soul  out  from  the  finite  into  the 
infinite ;  from  the  temporal  into  the  eternal,  pros- 
trating itself  at  the  feet  of  God,  palpitating  with 
one  consuming  desire." 

This  kind  of  prayer  "availeth  much."  How 
much?  It  is  measured,  as  to  its  effects,  only  by 
the  infinite  will  and  mercy  of  God.  Every  one  of 
us  who  is  a  Christian  is  a  Christian  in  answer  to 


42  How  Shall  We  Pray  that 

prayer,  the  prayer  probably  of  some  other  man  or 
woman,  and  also  always  in  answer  to  the  prayer 
of  Christ,  who  "continually  maketh  intercession 
for  us.''  Prayer  is  the  breath  of  the  soul,  by 
which  it  breathes  out  faith,  and  breathes  in  God. 
Prayer  occupies  an  exalted  place  in  the  history  of 
the  church  of  God.  Moses  saved  Israel  from  the 
divine  vengeance  by  his  prayers.  Elijah  brought 
drought,  ruin  and  fire  from  heaven  by  his  prayers. 
John  Knox  prayed,  "Give  me  Scotland  or  I  die," 
and  God  gave  him  Scotland.  The  disciples 
prayed  Peter  out  of  prison.  Paul  and  Silas  were 
praying  when  God  sent  the  earthquake  at  Philippi, 
opening  the  dungeon  doors,  and  loosing  every 
prisoner's  chains.  The  most  impressive  illustra- 
tion of  prayer  is  that  of  Christ  upon  His  knees,  in 
the  mountain  all  night,  under  the  sky  with  God; 
or  just  as  He  was  about  to  perform  miracles  of 
raising  the  dead,  or  in  Gethsemane  awaiting 
arrest,  or  on  Calvary  committing  His  spirit  to  His 
Father.  In  the  second  Psalm  we  read  of  the 
Father  commanding  His  Son,  "Ask  of  me,  and  I 
shall  give  Thee  the  heathen  for  Thy  inheritance, 
and  the  uttermost  part  of  the  earth  for  Thy  pos- 
session."  So  we  have  the  transcendent  spectacle 
of  prayer  in  the  Trinity,  the  Son  praying  the 
Father  for  a  lost  world,  and  the  world  will  be 
saved  in  answer  to  that  prayer  that  never  has 
ceased  nor  ever  will,  until  all  nations  shall  be 
converted,  and  every  knee  shall  bow  at  His  great 
and  holy  name.      Christ's  prayer  was  an  effec- 


Our  Prayers  May  Be  Answered  43 

tual  one,  for,  having  prayed  for  the  world,  He 
came  down  from  heaven  to  seek  and  to  save  that 
which  was  lost.  So  the  salvation  of  the  world 
begins  and  ends  with  prayer;  and  this  is  true  also 
of  the  individual  soul.  The  first  act  of  a  saved 
man  is  prayer,  and  prayer  is  his  last  breath. 
11 He  enters  heaven  with  prayer." 

In  St.  John's  Apocalypse  we  have  a  wide  view 
of  the  efficacy  of  prayer.  He  saw  seven  angels 
before  God  in  heaven.  And  another  angel  came 
and  stood  at  the  altar,  having  a  golden  censer; 
and  there  was  given  to  him  much  incense  that  he 
might  offer  it,  with  the  prayers  of  all  saints,  upon 
the  golden  altar  which  was  before  the  throne. 
And  the  smoke  of  the  incense,  which  came  with 
the  prayers  of  saints,  ascended  up  before  God, 
out  of  the  angel's  hand.  And  the  angel  took  the 
censer,  and  filled  it  with  the  fire  of  the  altar, 
and  cast  it  into  the  earth,  and  there  were  voices^ 
and  thunderings,  and  lightnings,  and  an  earth- 
quake. 

Then  followed  the  trumpet  blasts  of  the  seven 
angels,  each  in  turn,  the  signals  of  tremendous 
events  in  the  world.  Does  not  this  show  that 
the  prayers  of  "all  saints,"  sanctified  by  fire  from 
the  altar,  were  the  means  of  bringing  about  the 
vast  designs  of  God  in  the  plan  of  His  grace  for 
mankind,  and  that  the  prayers  of  saints  do  bring 
the  power  of  omnipotence  to  bear  upon  the  affairs 
of  nations  and  of  men? 

How   much,    then,    does   prayer    avail?      The 


44  How  Shall  We  Pray 

measure  is,  omnipotence,  regulated  by  the  wis- 
dom and  mercy  of  God.  So,  "the  effectual, 
fervent  prayer  of  a  righteous  man  availeth 
much."  How  much,  God  and  eternity  shall 
show. 


HOW  CAN  GOD  BE  GOOD  AND  LET 
MAN   SUFFER 

1  'surely  he  hath  borne  our  griefs  and  carried 
our  sorrows." — is.  53:  4. 

In  earlier  phases  of  human  experience  one  of 
the  most  comforting  thoughts  that  can  come  to 
the  mind  is  that  God  rules,  and  that  nothing  can 
come  to  pass  without  His  consent.  The  beauti- 
ful phrase  of  Christ  is  that  "Not  a  sparrow  falleth 
to  the  ground  without  your  Father,  and  ye  are  of 
more  value  than  many  sparrows. "  It  is  a  blessed 
thing  for  one  in  danger,  or  one  who  has  a  loved 
one  in  danger,  to  know  that  God  rules  in  all 
things  great  and  small.  But  to  a  man  who  has 
suffered  immeasurable  loss,  and  who  feels  that 
the  joy  and  light  of  his  life  are  gone,  it  is  not 
always  a  comfort  to  think  that  God  could  have 
prevented  his  misfortune  and  did  not. 

The  fundamental  conception  of  God  is  that  He 
is  almighty.  This  characteristic  of  God  stands 
out  above  all  others  in  the  minds  of  men,  and  we 
think  of  Him  as  the  one  and  only  person  who  can 
have  His  own  way,  who  is  never  frustrated,  and 
so  the  Psalmist  says,  "Our  God  is  in  the  heavens, 
He  hath  done  whatsoever  He  hath  pleased." 
Behind  this  lies  the  still  higher  fact  that  He  has 

45 


46  How  Can  God  Be  Good  and  Let  Man  Suffer 

always  known  what  He  would  do,  what  every 
creature  would  do.  Now  set  up  beside  this  stu- 
pendous fact  of  God's  omnipotence  and  omni- 
science the  other  fact  of  suffering  in  all  ages,  and 
among  all  the  sons  of  men.  Here  arises  a  prob- 
lem not  easy  to  solve ;  for  if  God  be  good,  how 
can  He  determine  to  permit  the  things  we  see  to 
come  to  pass  around  us  in  the  world? 

It  is  proper  to  answer,  God  made  man  free, 
setting  before  him  good  and  evil,  and  that  man 
freely  chose  evil  with  all  its  long  train  of  woe. 
Man  is  a  sinner,  and  deserves  all  he  suffers.  I 
know  that  is  true  of  myself,  and  you  know  that  it 
is  true  of  yourself;  yet  this  consideration  can  only 
shut  our  mouths  from  complaint.  It  introduces 
no  light  into  the  dark  mystery  of  suffering,  for 
we  still  ask,  Is  not  omnipotence  equal  to  the  task 
of  taking  a  sinful  world  and  making  it  good? 
Yes,  and  that  is  what  God  is  doing.  Then  comes 
this  burning  question,  Why  does  He  not  do  it 
now?  Here  is  a  world  of  sufferers,  a  world  of 
sinners,  indeed,  and  therefore  sufferers;  and  yet 
God  is  almighty,  and  God  is  good ;  why  does  He 
not  stop  sin  at  once,  and  dry  up  forever  the  foun- 
tain of  tears? 

We  have  a  vision  of  God  and  revelation  shows 
that  it  is  correct,  that  He  sits  upon  a  throne  of 
almightiness,  blazing  with  unapproachable  glory ; 
that  He  is  so  holy  the  very  heavens  are  unclean 
in  His  presence;  that  He  is  surrounded  with 
choirs  of  innumerable  angels  who  sing  His  praises 


How  Can  God  Be  Good  and  Let  Man  Suffer  47 

day  and  night;  that  His  being  is  filled  with 
infinite  bliss.  In  contrast  with  His  transcendent 
power,  glory,  and  happiness,  we  see  a  world 
reeking  with  sin,  stained  with  blood,  containing 
millions  of  sufferers,  every  one  of  whom  is  jour- 
neying towards  inevitable  death.  How  can  God 
be  happy  and  witness  what  every  man  witnesses? 
How  can  Omnipotence  remain  passive,  and  let  the 
awful  tragedy  of  human  suffering  go  on?  How 
can  God  be  good  and  let  man  suffer? 

This  is  the  poignant  question  of  the  ages. 
Men  have  always  suffered,  and  have  always  asked 
why  an  Almighty  God  does  not  by  a  word  He 
could  easily  speak  put  an  end  to  human  misery 
and  tears.  There  is  no  less  of  suffering  now  than 
there  ever  was,  and  this  question  confronts  every 
mortal.  He  looks  up  to  heaven  through  tears, 
and  asks  with  trembling  lips,  How  can  God  per- 
mit sorrow? 

Two  tremendous  facts  stand  out, — suffering  and 
God.  The  reconciliation  of  them  is  the  problem. 
Human  life  is  a  tragedy.  It  begins  with  a  sob; 
it  ends  with  a  sigh,  and  between  the  first  sob  and 
the  last  sigh  there  is  many  a  pang. 

Sickness  is  everywhere.  How  many  millions 
lay  last  night  upon  sleepless  couches  counting  the 
hours?  Enter  a  home  from  which  the  doctor's 
buggy  has  just  gone.  Climb  the  stairs.  On  a 
bed  lies  a  baby,  hollow-eyed,  pale.  Its  bony 
fingers  tell  of  disease,  pain,  and  approaching 
death,  while  at  its  side  sits  a  mother  whose  heart 


48  How  Can  God  Be  Good  and  Let  Man  Suffer 

is  breaking.  Another  home.  Here  lies  the  head 
of  the  house ;  consumption  has  stamped  the  seal 
of  death  upon  his  brow.  Nothing  to  do  but  wait 
for  the  inevitable  end.  Walk  among  the  cots  in 
a  hospital.  Here  are  long  ranks  of  sufferers; 
cancer,  fever,  tumor,  paralysis,  and  every  form 
of  disease  gathered,  a  museum  of  misery. 
Dreadful  surgery  will  be  done  to-day,  with  what 
result  God  knows.  Yonder  is  a  deaf  and  dumb 
asylum,  the  home  of  the  silent.  There  a  blind 
asylum,  where  sunlight  is  useless,  and  no  lamp 
need  be  lighted  at  night.  Hard  by  is  a  hospital 
for  the  insane,  where  laughter  means  misery,  and 
singing  sorrow.  Did  you  ever  see  a  battle-field? 
You  remember,  will  never  forget,  the  crushed, 
bleeding,  dying  and  dead  left  by  the  storm  of 
fire.  In  India  millions  of  walking  skeletons  are 
perishing  for  lack  of  a  morsel  of  food.  See  the 
unspeakable  pathos  of  famine. 

Drop  the  curtain.  We  have  seen  enough;  the 
heart  can  bear  no  more.  God  sees  these  things 
all  the  time,  and  He  is  God. 

Who  can  tell  the  mental  misery  carried  in 
human  breasts  day  by  day;  the  disappointments, 
anxieties,  bereavements,  the  death  in  life  of  in- 
numerable men  and  women,  the  grinding  poverty, 
the  sense  of  injustice,  the  memory  of  a  crime, 
the  betrayal  by  a  friend?  These  burden  hearts 
with  a  load  they  stagger  under  as  they  walk  their 
sorrowful  pathway  to  a  grave  they  often  covet, 
and  there  sits  God  upon  His  throne  of  bliss. 


How  Can  God  Be  Good  and  Let  Man  Suffer  49 

Think  of  the  suffering  of  the  innocent  for  the 
sins  of  the  wicked.  The  drunkard's  wife  and 
children  who  dread  to  see  the  father  come  to  his 
own  door.  The  poor  girl  betrayed  by  her  love, 
abused,  despised,  forsaken,  a  wreck  drifting  on 
the  tide,  while  he  who  ruined  her  goes  on,  for- 
getful, to  wealth,  to  marriage,  to  prosperity. 

Such  are  the  commonest  scenes  of  human  life. 
Who  does  not  know  them?  Truly  life  is  a 
tragedy,  and  all  must  suffer,  must  die,  and  even 
the  best  are  doomed  to  a  grave.  Is  it  sufficient 
to  say,  in  explanation  of  all  this,  that  men  are 
sinners,  and  must  suffer  the  natural  consequences 
of  their  sins?  that  they  deserve  it  all?  This  may 
satisfy  the  philosopher  in  academic  halls,  or  the 
theologian  in  his  study;  it  does  not  satisfy  the 
man  with  a  hopeless  sorrow. 

He  says,  "Yes,  but  God  is  almighty.  He  can 
do  all  things.  He  can  stop  suffering  if  He  will. 
If  sin  be  the  cause  of  suffering,  why  does  He  not 
stop  sin?"  He  is  told  that  law  must  be  vindi- 
cated, and  eternal  justice  satisfied,  but  this  is  poor 
comfort  to  a  broken  heart,  and  it  still  replies, 
"God  is  almighty;  He  made  the  world;  it  is  His 
world;  can  He  not  set  it  right?" 

These  are  the  things  that  make  infidels,  that 
cause  them  to  say,  "No,  we  cannot  believe  it; 
there  is  no  God.  God  could  not  sit  in  glory  and 
bliss  and  let  His  own  world  go  on  a  hideous  scene 
of  pain  and  woe. ' '  And  yet  the  evidence  is  over- 
whelming, and  we  know  there  is  a  God 


50  How  Can  God  Be  Good  and  Let  Man  Suffer 

I  shall  not  attempt  the  explanation  of  these 
mysteries  of  sorrow.  My  explanation  might 
silence  the  mind,  but  it  would  not  satisfy  the 
heart.  Is  there  anything  in  all  the  universe  that 
can  persuade  a  man  crushed  to  earth  with  sorrow 
to  believe  that  God  is  good?  Where  is  the  philos- 
ophy of  the  universe  that  can  throw  light  upon 
this  question? 

There  is  but  one  thing  that  can  reconcile  man 
to  suffering.  I  do  not  say  that  it  is  an  explana- 
tion ;  it  is  a  reconciliation.  There  is  one  thing 
that  will  reconcile  a  man  to  sorrow,  unexplained, 
mysterious,  unfathomable,  and  enable  him  to  bear 
it  unmurmuringly,  satisfied  to  wait  for  explana- 
tion in  the  world  beyond  death. 

It  is  this:  I  find  God,  the  Almighty,  the  Holy, 
the  Blissful,  descending  from  His  celestial  abode 
to  become  a  sufferer  like  me.  I  see  Him  walk 
among  men,  "a  Man  of  Sorrows,  and  acquainted 
with  grief."  I  hear  Him  weep,  and  His  sobs  are 
just  like  mine.  I  hear  Him  groan  under  pain, 
betrayal,  oppression,  and  shame.  I  behold  Him 
dying  on  a  cross,  and  follow  to  see  Him  laid  in  a 
tomb.  I  ask,  "Who  is  this?"  and  am  told, 
"This  is  He  who  made  the  world,  who  made 
man,  who  was  perfectly  blessed,  and  who  is 
Almighty."  I  ask,  why  He  did  not  exercise  His 
omnipotence  to  end  His  own  miseries,  and  the 
answer  is,  because  He  loved  men  so  He  would 
not  save  Himself.  He  saved  others;  Himself 
He  could,  but  would  not  save.     He  took  our  sins, 


How  Can  God  Be  Good  and  Let  Man  Suffer  51 

our  sorrows,  and  made  them  His  own  that  the 
law  He  had  promulgated  might  be  satisfied ;  that 
He  might  save  all  sinners  and  sufferers.  He 
drank  our  cup  of  woe  that  we  might  not  have  to 
drink  it,  and  He  drained  it  to  its  dregs. 

The  sting  of  death  is  sin,  and  the  sting  of  sor- 
row is  sin.  He  atones  for  sin,  and  forgives  it. 
He  declares  absolution  to  all  who  are  truly  peni- 
tent; absolution  through  His  own  blood.  I  have 
this  to  say  to  every  sufferer:  "Christ,  God 
incarnate,  died  for  you." 

Two  things  the  death  of  Christ  does  to  reconcile 
us  to  suffering:  first,  He  proves  His  goodness  by 
suffering  with  us  and  for  our  sake;  and,  second, 
it  makes  suffering  the  pathway  to  the  highest 
glory  and  happiness. 

The  first  thing  is  to  prove  His  goodness  and  to 
reconcile  us  to  suffering.  There  is  no  suffering 
too  great  to  be  offset  by  the  spectacle  of  the  divine 
Law-Giver,  the  Almighty  Ruler  of  the  universe 
weeping,  dying  among  men  and  for  men.  "Jesus 
wept,"  recorded  of  Him  by  the  tomb  of  His 
friend,  brings  great  comfort,  and  His  dying  on 
the  cross  throws  a  glow  of  celestial  light  on  all 
suffering. 

Come,  O  mother,  with  your  dead  babe  in  your 
arms,  come  and  see  the  dying  Christ!  Come, 
wife  of  the  drunkard,  come  with  your  little  chil- 
dren, and  see  the  Lord  of  Glory  upon  His  cross! 
Come,  deserted  outcast,  woman,  come  look  upon 
Him  who  is  the  friend  of  sinners,  bearing  your 


52  How  Can  God  Be  Good  and  Let  Man  Suffer 

sin,  not  only,  but  your  sorrow  too!     You  cannot 
complain  in  sight  of  Calvary. 

We  hold  up  Christ  crucified  before  men.  We 
hold  Him  up  in  sick  chambers,  in  homes  for  the 
unfortunate,  in  prisons,  hospitals,  at  funerals, 
the  grave-side,  and  on  battle-fields.  Men  say, 
"Is  this  my  God?"  "Yes,  this  is  the  Infinite,  the 
All  Holy,  All  Good,  and  His  name  is  Love." 
"Well,"  they  answer,  "this  is  a  God  I  can  love, 
and  believe  in.  I  can  trust  my  soul  and  life  in 
His  keeping,  and  wait  for  the  explanation  of  my 
sufferings  until  He  takes  rne  to  His  home  on 
high."  The  dear,  sad  cross  extends  its  arms  to 
embrace  all  sufferers,  and  points  aloft  to  peace 
and  rest  with  God. 

But  the  Scripture  view  of  God's  use  of  sorrow 
looks  higher  than  mere  submission.  It  is  not 
enough  for  men  to  bear  trouble  unmurmuringly. 
God  enables  man  to  acquiesce  in  sorrow,  and  even 
to  see  in  it  the  pathway  by  which  he  climbs,  with 
bleeding  feet  indeed,  but  still  climbs,  to  his  high- 
est possibilities  of  life,  character  and  achievement. 
"Blessed  is  the  man  that  endureth  temptation," 
or  trial;  "for  when  he  is  tried  he  shall  receive  the 
crown  of  life,  which  the  Lord  hath  promised  to 
them  that  love  Him."  In  other  words,  the  tried 
or  afflicted  man  may,  God's  grace  assisting  him, 
see  in  sorrow  not  his  greatest  curse,  but  one  of  his 
greatest  blessings,  and  after  he  has  borne  the 
trials  of  this  present  life,  may  look  back  and 
rejoice   over  his   afflictions  more  than  over  his 


How  Can  God  Be  Good  and  Let  Man  Suffer  53 

prosperity.  St.  Paul  rejoiced  that  he  was  counted 
worthy  to  suffer  for  Christ's  sake. 

Now  the  apostle's  sufferings  were  many  of 
them  the  effect  of  persecution  laid  upon  him 
because  he  was  a  follower  of  Christ,  the  effect  of 
hatred  to  his  Lord.  In  a  sense  these  are  easier 
to  bear  than  the  ordinary  afflictions  that  come 
upon  men,  because  it  is  so  easy  to  see  that  they 
are  for  the  sake  of  Him  who  died  to  save  our 
souls  from  death.  The  martyrs  could  feel  a  fel- 
lowship with  Christ  in  their  sufferings.  Their 
sufferings  were  akin  to  His,  and  before  their 
eyes  was  always  present  the  cross  upon  which 
their  Saviour  died.  They  knew  that  by  His  cross 
Christ  rose  to  His  highest  glory  as  the  Saviour  of 
men,  and  that  the  circlet  of  thorns  was  the  most 
splendid  crown  He  ever  wore. 

But  this  does  not  seem  to  apply  to  the  suffer- 
ings we  endure  in  the  common  tragedy  of  human 
life.  What  connection  is  there  between  Christ's 
sufferings  and  the  pains  men  feel  when  preyed 
upon  by  disease?  Here  is  the  leper,  the  con- 
sumptive, the  fever  stricken,  the  cancerous. 
Here  are  the  sufferers  from  afflictions  of  the 
heart,  the  bereaved,  the  disappointed,  the  poor, 
the  sin-cursed.  Is  there  any  gleam  of  light  for 
these?  Is  there  anything  that  can  connect  their 
sufferings  with  glory  or  a  crown  of  life?  Yes; 
St.  James  says,  "Blessed  is  the  man,"  no  matter 
who  he  is,  "that  endureth  temptation"  or  trial; 
"for  when  he  is  tried  he  shall  receive  the  crown 


54  How  Can  God  Be  Good  and  Let  Man  Suffer 

of  life."  This  means  that  any  trial  of  the  body, 
or  of  the  mind,  may  be  endured  in  such  a  way  as 
that  it  shall  be  the  means  of  our  attaining  the 
highest  possibilities  of  our  being.  It  intimates 
that  all  pain  and  sorrow  may  be  sanctified,  and 
all  affliction  made  subservient  to  our  greatest 
good.  Even  the  pangs  that  follow  sin  may  be 
made  the  birth  throes  of  an  entrance  into  life 
likest  unto  God. 

Of  course,  if  this  end  is  obtained,  sorrow  is  not 
to  be  borne  with  stolid  stoicism,  but  in  loving 
acquiescence  with  the  will  of  God.  It  does  not 
imply  that  we  always  know  how  sorrow  shall 
elevate  us.  Sorrow  is  often  as  much  a  mystery 
to  a  child  of  God  as  it  is  to  any  other  man.  He 
walks  in  the  dark.  Not  one  step  before  can  he 
see.  All  below  his  feet  and  all  above  his  head  is 
darkness  impenetrable.  Yet  he  believes  what 
God  tells  him.  His  trust  is  in  Him,  all  the 
sweeter,  ofttimes,  because  he  cannot  see.  He 
can  only  feel  a  great  hand  holding,  leading  him. 
"I  will  fear  no  evil,"  he  says,  "for  Thou  art  with 
me,  Thy  rod  and  Thy  staff  they  comfort  me. "  It 
may  be  too  dark  to  see  even  the  face  of  God,  but 
he  knows  by  the  faith  of  his  soul,  by  the  whisper 
of  strength  in  his  weakness,  that  his  God  is  near. 

Now  he  may  not  be  able  to  sing.  Singing  is 
hardly  the  thing  when  we  are  enveloped  in  im- 
penetrable woe.  Rather,  he  would  be  silent,  and 
he  says,  "I  was  dumb.  I  opened  not  my  mouth, 
because  Thou  didst  it. ' '     There  are  times  when 


How  Can  God  Be  Good  and  Let  Man  Suffer  5  5 

the  highest  utterance  is  silence,  and  we  often  say 
our  best  words  when  the  lips  are  dumb. 

The  secret  is  this,  our  sufferings  are  the  suffer- 
ings of  Christ.  He  makes  our  sorrows  all  His 
own.  "We  suffer  with  Him,  that  we  may  also  be 
glorified  together."  It  is  the  same  principle 
upon  which  we  tried  to  reconcile  ourselves  to  the 
fact  that  there  is  sorrow,  and  that  God  does  not 
prevent  or  end  it — that  the  God-man  suffers  with 
men.  We  ceased  to  complain  because  we  saw 
Him  dying  on  the  cross.  So  here  we  find  our- 
selves, by  sorrow,  entering  into  co-partnership 
with  the  Divine  Sufferer.  Fellowship  with  Christ 
is  the  highest  experience  of  the  soul,  even  when 
it  comes  through  pangs  that  break  the  heart. 

Here,  then,  is  the  gracious  truth.  God  in 
Christ  has  glorified  all  suffering,  if  the  sufferer 
but  feels  that  it  is  His  will  and  endures  it  with 
loving  acquiescence.  So  the  cross  of  Christ  be- 
comes the  reconciliation  of  the  soul  to  all  suffer- 
ing. 

"The  crown  of  life" — what  crown  is  that?  It 
means  the  life  that  crowns  all;  the  crowning  life. 
The  greatest  thing  we  know  is  life,  and  this  is  the 
highest  life.  It  is  a  life  that  brings  us  nearest  to 
God,  because  it  is  most  like  unto  His.  It  is  not 
something  placed  upon  our  heads,  a  thing  ex- 
ternal to  ourselves ;  it  is  ourselves,  the  making  of 
man  like  God.  Man  was  made  at  first  "a  little 
lower  than  the  angels, ' '  but  by  suffering  borne 
for  Christ's  sake,  we  are  made  above  the  angels, 


56  How  Can  God  Be  Good  and  Let  Man  Suffer 

for  we  thus  attain  unto  the  crown  of  life,  the 
highest  life,  next  to  God. 

So  in  the  great  tragedy  of  life,  there  is  intro- 
duced a  divine  plan  and  purpose,  and  sorrow  is 
seen  to  be  a  minister  of  mercy.  Though  we  can- 
not understand  all  the  deep  mystery  of  the 
method,  we  can  understand  the  end,  and  can  see 
that  out  of  the  groans  and  tears  of  humanity  God 
will  bring  not  His  own  glory  merely,  but  the 
glory  of  humanity;  indeed,  that  He  glorifies  Him- 
self by  glorifying  man.  As  Christ  reached  His 
highest  glory  by  suffering,  so  do  we,  and  the 
cross  becomes  the  symbol  of  His  glory  and  ours. 

So  the  solution  of  the  mystery  of  sorrow  is  in 
Christ  crucified.  "  Surely  He  hath  borne  our 
griefs  and  carried  our  sorrows, ' '  and  we  arrive  at 
this  glorious  conclusion — the  sorrows  of  man  are 
the  sorrows  of  the  Son  of  God,  and  as  He  was 
made  perfect  through  suffering,  so  suffering  is 
the  ladder  by  which  we  climb  to  the  greatest 
glory  and  the  highest  bliss. 


CAN  GOD  BE  SOVEREIGN  AND  MAN 
FREE 

"i  AM  THE  LORD,  AND  THERE  IS  NONE  ELSE,  THERE 
IS  NO  GOD  BESIDE  ME:  I  HAVE  MADE  THE  EARTH,  AND 
CREATED  MAN  UPON  IT." IS.    45:  5,    12. 

Our  shortsighted  minds  are  often  troubled  to 
think  that  it  is  of  no  use  for  us  to  try  to  be  or  to 
do  anything,  because  we  live  in  a  universe  in 
company  with  a  God  who  is  infinite  and  will  have 
His  way.  We  know  that  God  is  Sovereign. 
Every  conception  of  God  includes  that,  and  we 
feel  that  His  power  has  no  limitations.  Then 
we  ask,  if  God  be  Sovereign,  am  I  free?  Have  I 
any  choice  in  my  life  and  destiny?  Is  it  possible 
that  I  can  be  free,  if  God  is  supreme?  We  want 
to  feel  that  we  are  free,  and  yet  we  shrink  from 
thinking  that  God  is  not  Sovereign. 

God  is  Sovereign;  what  does  this  imply?  He 
oivns  things. 

Ownership  comes  by  gift  or  acquisition.  God 
gets  nothing  by  gift  or  acquisition,  but  by  crea- 
tion. This  is  the  only  absolute  ownership.  A 
thing  had  no  existence ;  it  was  not,  He  made  it, 
and  it  was;  whose  is  it?  God's,  and  His  title  is 
indisputable  and  unforfeitable.  The  first  two 
questions  and  answers  of  the  child's  catechism  lay 

57 


58         Can  God  Be  Sovereign  and  Man  Free 

bare  the  foundations  of  divine  ownership  and 
sovereignty.  "Who  made  you?  God.  What 
else  did  God  make?  All  things."  This  puts 
God  above  all  things,  and  seats  Him  upon  a 
throne  of  sovereignty  where  He  can  have  no 
rival.  Every  created  thing,  if  it  could  speak, 
would  respond  as  the  child  does  to  the  first  ques- 
tion of  the  child's  catechism.  Ask  a  flower,  Who 
made  you?  God.  Ask  a  star,  Who  made  you? 
God.  Ask  a  man,  Who  made  you?  God.  And 
so  with  everything  that  is,  from  a  butterfly  to  an 
archangel — from  a  grain  of  sand  to  a  planet.  So 
at  the  apex  of  all  things  sits  God— the  only  Uni- 
versal Sovereign,  because  the  'only  Creator. 

He  knows  things.  What  things?  All  things. 
We  know  by  intuition  or  by  study.  I  know 
by  intuition  that  a  whole  is  greater  than  a 
part;  and  I  learn  that  two  and  two  make  four. 
All  that  I  know  I  learn,  in  history,  in  nature,  in 
art,  and  in  philosophy.  But  God  learns  nothing. 
To  learn  a  thing  implies  that  once  I  did  not  know 
it,  and  now  I  do.  There  was  no  time  when  God 
did  not  know  all  things.  He  has  never  learned, 
because  He  always  knew.  Nor  can  we  say  that 
God  knows  anything  by  intuition.  Intuition 
means  inner  teaching,  learning  without  a  teacher. 
It  implies  that  a  soul  is  born  and  opens  its  men- 
tal vision  to  see  certain  truths  that  only  need  to 
be  seen  to  be  known.  We  can  hardly  say  God 
knows  anything  by  intuition,  for  that  implies  that 
He  became  conscious  of  things  by  seeing  them, 


Can  God  Be  Sovereign  and  Man  Free        59 

and  this  means  that  they  were  before  God. 
There  was  nothing  before  God.  God  did  not 
awake  to  see  things;  God  was  awake  before  there 
was  anything  to  see.  God  always  saw  things 
before  they  were,  because  there  wasn't  anything 
until  God  made  it,  and  God  always  knew  what 
He  would  make,  and  what  everything  He  was 
going  to  make  would  do.  So  God  has  never 
learned  anything,  because  He  always  foreknew 
all  things. 

He  does  things.  What  things?  "Whatsoever 
He  hath  pleased."  There  is  nothing  He  cannot 
do.  A  little  man  does  little  things;  a  large  man 
does  large  things;  a  great  man  does  great  things; 
and  the  greatest  man  does  the  greatest  things. 
A  man's  greatness  is  measured  by  the  greatness 
of  what  he  can  do.  How  great  are  the  things 
God  can  do!  He  can  do  all  things;  there  is 
nothing  too  great  for  Him.  He  is  limitless — 
infinite.  This  is  the  salient  attribute  of  God, 
that  He  is  limitless,  and  this  is  the  fundamental 
difference  between  God  and  man,  that  man  is 
limited  and  God  is  not.  There  are  many  things 
man  cannot  do;  there  is  nothing  God  cannot  do. 

So  we  see  the  basis  of  God's  sovereignty,  and 
also  how  unlimited  it  is.  It  is  self-dependent. 
No  other  sovereignty  is  self-dependent.  The 
Czar  of  Russia  is  a  sovereign,  the  most  absolute 
of  all  human  rulers,  among  civilized  nations,  and 
he  may  say  that  he  is  Czar  in  his  own  right,  but 
is  he?     No;    he  is  Czar  by  the  sufferance  of  his 


60         Can  God  Be  Sovereign  and  Man  Free 

people.  If  they  will  they  may  dethrone  him, 
and  cut  off  his  head.  This  has  often  happened  to 
human  sovereigns ;  because  they  were  dependent 
upon  the  will  of  their  people.  But  God  is  self- 
dependent.  No  one  can  dethrone  Him,  because 
He  depends  upon  no  one  but  Himself.  "Who 
can  stay  His  hand,  or  say  unto  Him,  What  doest 
Thou?"  And  the  answer  is,  no  one;  no  man  nor 
angel,  nor  all  men  and  all  angels.  He  made 
them,  and  He  can  unmake  them,  in  an  instant, 
if  He  will. 

He  admits  no  one  to  share  His  sovereignty. 
He  has  no  cabinet,  no  legislature,  no  constitution 
of  His  empire,  no  judiciary,  no  partner.  He  is 
law-maker,  and  law-executor.  In  His  sov- 
ereignty He  sits  alone,  in  the  eternal  and  limit- 
less power  of  His  Godship. 

These  reflections  set  before  us  a  conception  of 
a  God  of  unapproachable  majesty,  but  unless  we 
add  something  more  than  limitless  power  and 
knowledge,  we  have  a  being  whom  His  creatures 
could  only  fear.  There  could  be  no  love,  nor 
worship  towards  a  God  simply  of  limitless  power. 
Let  us  add  other  limitless  attributes — wisdom, 
holiness,  justice,  goodness,  truth — and  take  up  a 
statement  He  Himself  has  authorized,  "God  is 
love."  "Well,"  we  say,  "if  God  is  love,  He  can- 
not be  too  great;  we  would  not  have  Him  limited 
if  we  could. ' ' 

Here,  then,  is  the  God  of  the  Bible ;  a  sovereign 
of     unlimited    knowledge     and     power,    whose 


Can  God  Be  Sovereign  and  Man  Free        61 

majesty  is  illuminated  by  love.  Love  illuminates 
divinity  as  the  sun  lights  up  a  cloud  when  it 
pours  its  light  above,  beneath,  and  through  it, 
changing  its  gloom  to  glory. 

Is  man  free  ?  The  Bible  takes  it  for  granted 
that  he  is.  The  book  is  full  of  invitations  to 
man  to  come  to  God,  and  be  saved;  and  we  feel 
that  God  would  not  call  a  man  who  was  not  free 
to  come.  It  would  be  a  mockery  to  call  a  man 
whose  feet  are  fast  in  the  stocks,  who  is  confined 
in  dungeon  walls,  or  who  is  held  fast  by  an 
enemy.  He  says,  "Come  unto  me,  all  ye  ends  of 
the  earth,  and  be  ye  saved."  "Come  unto  me, 
and  I  will  give  you  rest. "  "Fly  from  the  wrath  to 
come."  "Choose  ye  this  day  whom  ye  will 
serve."  The  whole  Bible  is  an  invitation  to  man 
to  come  to  God.  He  can't  come,  indeed,  without 
God's  help,  but  God  stands  ready  to  help  him. 
He  says,  come  out  of  your  prison,  and  stands 
ready  to  break  open  the  door.  He  is  too  weak  to 
walk;  He  says,  I  will  give  you  strength.  He  has 
not  the  will  to  go,  God  will  give  him  the  power 
to  will. 

Men  know  that  they  are  free  to  accept  or  re- 
ject God's  offers.  They  feel  this  when  they 
reject  them,  and  are  therefore  chided  by  their 
consciences.  If  you  are  not  a  Christian,  you 
know  it  is  your  fault,  not  God's.  It  is  not 
because  you  could  not  be  one.  We  are  conscious 
of  freedom,  and  this  freedom  is  one  of  our  most 
precious  possessions.     I  say  to  you,  "Lift  up  your 


6a         Can  God  Be  Sovereign  and  Man  Free 

hand, ' '  and  you  feel  that  you  are  free  to  do  it  or 
not,  as  you  please,  and  there  is  great  happiness 
in  this  sense  of  liberty.  You  were  free  to  visit  a 
friend  yesterday,  or  to  stay  at  home;  to  go  to 
your  place  of  business  or  to  go  to  the  country. 
Your  freedom  is  one  of  the  most  distinctive  char- 
acteristics of  your  being,  as  compared  with  the 
brutes.  Your  freedom  is  to  you  what  the  ocean 
is  to  the  fish,  the  air  to  the  bird.  Thank  God,  we 
are  free. 

But  is  our  freedom  unlimited?  Can  I  do  all  the 
things  I  want  to  do?  Have  I  always  succeeded  in 
doing  what  I  wished?  Certainly  not.  I  am  free, 
but  free  within  certain  bounds.  The  fish  is  free 
to  swim  in  the  deep  wide  sea,  but  not  upon  the 
land,  and  the  bird  may  fly  in  the  air,  but  the  air 
only  reaches  for  a  certain  number  of  miles  above 
the  earth.  The  fish  and  the  bird  are  free,  and 
yet  their  freedom  is  limited.  So  it  is  with  me.  I 
am  free,  but  within  certain  bounds.  I  am  limited 
by  my  powers,  by  circumstances,  and  by  a  mys- 
terious restraint  and  guidance  that  come  from 
Him  who  rules  all  things.  God  gave  me  my 
powers,  makes  my  circumstances,  and  rules  my 
life.  So  I  am  free  as  far  as  God  allows.  David 
says,  "Thou  hast  beset  me,  behind  and  before," 
and  St.  Paul  speaks  of  God  as  one  "in  whom  we 
live  and  move  and  have  our  being."  The  only 
limitless  fre'edom  is  God's.  This  is  necessarily 
true,  because  there  cannot  be  two  infinite  beings 
in  one  universe.      Granted  one  limitless  being, 


Can  God  Be  Sovereign  and  Man  Free        6$ 

and  all  other  beings  are  limited,  as  He  pleases. 
God's  freedom  is  infinite,  and  ours  is  finite,  be- 
cause His  is  infinite.  Because  He  is  limitless,  I 
am  limited.  Therefore,  we  conclude  that  God  is 
sovereign  because  He  is  God,  and  man  is  free  as 
far  as  God  allows,  but  his  freedom  is  enveloped 
by  the  all-surrounding  sovereignty  of  God. 

We  have  liberty  under  law;  law  which  limits 
our  liberty.  A  fish  is  free  as  far  as  the  water 
goes ;  no  farther.  A  bird  is  free  as  far  as  the  air 
extends,  but  cannot  fly  beyond  it.  It  is  so  in 
human  government.  A  citizen  is  free  as  far  as 
the  law  allows.  He  is  not  free  to  take  his  neigh- 
bor's money,  life,  or  any  other  property.  Let 
him  go  beyond  this  lawful  liberty,  and  he  forfeits 
all  liberty,  is  made  a  prisoner,  or  is  put  to  death. 
All  God's  creatures  are  born  under  God's  law, 
and  are  free  just  so  far  as  God  provides,  but  even 
here  the  exercise  of  liberty  is  regulated  by  law. 
Liberty  is  the  opportunity  to  do  right;  not  license 
to  do  wrong.  All  wrong  is  forbidden  by  divine 
law.  A  man  is  free  to  do  wrong,  not  in  the  sense 
that  it  is  lawful,  but  that  he  is  not  forced  to  do 
right.  He  is  a  free  agent  responsible  for  his  con- 
duct. A  man  is  a  slave  if  he  do  right  merely  from 
fear  of  law  and  its  penalty.  A  man  is  free  who 
does  right  because  he  loves  to.  Right  is  what  he 
desires,  and  he  is  free  because  he  does  what  he 
wants  to.  He  is  not  conscious  of  law,  or  of 
restraint.  Good  people  do  not  steal  nor  com- 
mit murder ;   is  it  because  these  things  are  con- 


64         Can  God  Be  Sovereign  and  Man  Free 

trary  to  law  and  will  be  punished?  No;  it  is 
because  they  don't  want  to  steal  nor  to  do  murder. 
This  is  the  liberty  offered  to  all  God's  intelligent 
creatures  as  He  made  them;  and  as  long  as  they 
continued  in  their  original  state,  they  were  uncon- 
scious of  law,  felt  no  restraint,  and  God's  service 
was  perfect  freedom.  To  this  original  estate  the 
plan  of  salvation  is  intended  to  restore  men. 
When  they  arrive  at  it  they  are  perfectly  free  and 
perfectly  happy.  This  consummation  is  partially 
attained  here,  and  perfectly  hereafter.  Then  the 
fish  is  perfectly  free  in  the  sea,  because  it  does 
not  wish  to  go  out  of  it  upon  the  land;  and  the 
bird  is  free  in  its  native  element  because  it  has  no 
desire  to  get  beyond  the  air. 

But  in  this  liberty  of  the  Children  of  God  they 
are  not  free  from  divine  control.  In  a  mysterious 
way,  but  most  effectively,  God  restrains  and 
guides  them  according  to  His  own  wise  sovereign 
plan.  This  He  does  without  forcing  man's  will. 
He  does  no  violence  to  the  will  of  His  creatures, 
and  in  the  great  matter  of  conversion,  "He  doth 
persuade  and  enable  us  to  embrace  Jesus  Christ, 
as  He  is  freely  offered  to  us  in  the  Gospel. "  The 
Scripture  says,  "I  will  make  them  willing  in  the 
day  of  my  power. "  God  makes  man's  will  free 
to  choose  the  service  of  his  Creator.  He  will 
have  no  slaves  in  His  kingdom,  and  no  one  is  a 
servant  of  God  against  his  will. 

So  our  freedom  is  enveloped  in  the  all-sur- 
rounding sovereignty  of  God.     How  I  am  free 


Can  God  Be  Sovereign  and  Man  Free        65 

and  God  Sovereign,  how  He  has  His  way,  and  yet 
I  am  free,  is  a  question  not  easy  to  answer;  but  it 
is  not  necessary  to  answer  it.  I  know  I  am  free, 
and  rejoice  in  it,  and  I  say,  I  am  free  because 
God  makes  me  free. 

Instead  of  it  being  a  misfortune  that  my  free- 
dom is  limited  by  the  sovereign  will  of  God,  it  is 
an  unspeakable  blessing.  Would  you  like  to  feel 
that  your  destiny  is  entirely  in  your  own  hands? 
Certainly  not.  Would  you  be  willing  to  have 
absolute  unrestrained  liberty  to  do  what  you 
pleased  for  one  day?  If  you  had  this  limitless 
liberty  for  twenty-four  hours,  what  would  you  do 
with  it?  One  would  make  himself  a  multi-mil- 
lionaire, another  a  universal  king,  and  so  on.  In 
one  day  you  would  do  enough  mischief  to  mar  the 
balance  of  your  life,  for  time  and  eternity.  If 
you  had  one  day  of  limitless  liberty,  the  best  way 
you  could  spend  it  would  be  on  your  knees  asking 
God  to  make  you  submissive  to  His  will.  The 
next  best  thing  would  be  for  you  to  spend  it 
sound  asleep  in  your  bed,  with  orders  not  to  be 
awakened  for  any  purpose,  until  after  sunset. 

Each  one  of  us  is  conscious  of  a  stronger  will 
than  his  leading  his  life  and  shaping  his  destiny 
towards  an  end  beyond  his  own  thought  or  plan. 
This  is  not  a  welcome  thought  to  an  unbeliever ; 
but  to  a  man  who  has  accepted  God  and  Christ  it 
is  a  glorious  fact.  He  feels  that  His  mistakes 
will  be  overruled  and  corrected  by  infinite  wis- 
dom, that  his  sins  will  be  forgiven,  blotted  out  by 


66         Can  God  Be  Sovereign  and  Man  Free 

precious  blood,  that  divine  love  has  a  great  plan 
for  him  that  nothing  can  frustrate.  It  means 
that  he  is  under  a  God  that  makes  "all  things 
work  together  for  good  to  them  that  love  Him." 
This  reconciles  him  to  poverty,  disappointment, 
injustice,  persecution,  pain,  sickness  and  death. 
It  introduces  a  glorious  element  of  hope  and  joy 
into  all  this  troubled  life  of  ours,  and  makes  all 
paths  lead  onward  and  upward  to  light.  What 
can  be  more  comforting  to  a  man  than  to  feel 
that  his  liberty  is  all  enveloped  by  the  sovereignty 
of  God,  and  he  wants  no  greater  freedom  than 
that  which  lies  within  the  circumference  of  His 
infinite  will. 


WHAT  IS  THE  GREATEST  DEFECT 

IN  OUR  NATIONAL 

CHARACTER 

WERS 
ROM.    13:   I. 

"What  is  required  in  the  fifth  commandment?" 
"The  fifth  commandment  (which  is  'Honor,'  etc.) 
requireth  the  preserving  the  honor,  and  perform- 
ing the  duties  belonging  to  every  one,  in  their 
several  places  and  relations,  as  superiors,  in- 
feriors, or  equals. "  This  magnificent  declaration 
lays  down  a  principle  of  conservatism  which,  if 
observed  by  mankind,  would  bring  about  condi- 
tions of  the  highest  order,  prosperity  and  progress. 

The  text  sets  forth,  in  the  form  of  a  direct 
command,  the  same  great  principle,  showing  that 
the  various  powers  or  governments  of  every  kind, 
not  subversive  of  the  government  of  God  over  the 
human  conscience,  are  to  be  obeyed.  The  use  of 
the  plural,  "powers,"  instead  of  power,  includes 
all  kinds  and  grades  of  government,  from  pa- 
rental authority  up  to  that  of  the  supreme  national 
ruler  in  the  country  where  we  dwell.  It  means 
that  children  must  obey  their  parents  "in  the 
Lord,"  not  only  but  that  while  rulers  do  not  com- 
mand us  to  disobey  God,  we  must  render  to  them 

67 


68    Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character 

the  honor  and  duty  required,  whether  the  govern- 
ment be  a  monarchy  or  a  republic ;  whether  we 
live  in  our  own  favored  commonwealth,  in  Great 
Britain,  or  under  the  Sultan  of  Turkey,  the  Czar 
of  Russia,  or  the  Emperor  of  China.  And  be  it 
noted  that  this  command,  and  the  whole  New 
Testament  system  of  morals,  were  elaborated  and 
declared,  while  the  world  was  groaning  under 
one  of  the  most  complete  tyrannies  ever  known. 
Our  blessed  Lord  also,  in  the  memorable  inter- 
view between  Himself  and  those  who  wished  to 
get  from  Him  as  a  claimant  for  kingship  a 
declaration  by  which  they  could  charge  Him  with 
sedition,  enjoined  loyal  obedience  to  existing  gov- 
ernment when  He  pronounced  those  words  of 
marvelous  wisdom:  "Render  therefore  unto 
Caesar  the  things  that  are  Caesar's,  and  unto  God 
the  things  that  are  God's." 

If  God,  by  His  direct  or  by  His  permissive 
decree,  ordains  that  any  government  shall  exist, 
all  Christians  who  live  under  it  are  to  be  good 
citizens  and  obey  the  laws,  except,  as  is  often 
stated  and  everywhere  implied,  when  the  human 
ruler  requires  us  to  sin  against  the  Supreme 
Being.  Then  the  ultimate  appeal  must  be  to 
Him,  and  we  must  obey  God  rather  than  man, 
even  though  it  be  at  the  cost  of  all  earthly  pos- 
sessions and  life  itself.  This  principle  that  "God- 
alone  is  Lord  of  the  conscience,"  has  illuminated 
the  pages  of  history,  and  given  the  world  its 
greatest  heroes.     But  even  in  the  case  of  rulers 


Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character  69 

who  command  us  to  sin  against  God,  we  are 
bound  to  obey  them  in  things  that  are  right. 

Thus  we  see  that  a  supreme  duty  for  all  men  is 
reverence  for  law;  human  law,  so  long  as  it 
does  not  contradict  the  divine;  but  law  which 
determines  our  relations  to  one  another,  and  to 
God,  is  to  be  reverenced  and  obeyed. 

We  are  born  under  law,  and  born  unequal  in 
all  our  capacities,  circumstances  and  relations, 
and  our  happiness  depends  entirely  upon  our 
loyal  and  faithful  acquiescence  in  the  laws  of 
God,  and  those  of  man  which  accord  with  His. 

Now,  if  human  laws  are  right,  but  through  cor- 
ruption or  cowardice  they  be  not  enforced,  the 
citizens  are  not,  except  when  left  defenseless,  to 
take  the  law  into  their  own  hands.  There  are 
laws  which  purport  to  punish  with  death  certain 
crimes  which  are  specially  prevalent  in  some  sec- 
tions of  the  nation,  but  it  is  an  almost  daily 
occurrence  for  the  friends  of  those  who  are  out- 
raged by  brutal  men,  to  take  the  law  into  their 
own  hands  and  punish  the  offenders  with  instant 
and  awful  death.  Aside  from  the  constant  dan- 
ger of  taking  the  life  of  some  suspected  person 
who  is  innocent,  this  is  entirely  wrong,  unless 
we  are  satisfied  that  the  just  penalties  of  crime 
will  not  be  inflicted  by  those  who  are  charged 
with  the  administration  of  justice.  If  this  be 
true,  which  few  would  be  willing  to  admit,  those 
who  are  entrusted  with  the  sacred  judicial  func- 
tion should  be  replaced  by  men  of  character  and 


70    Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character 

integrity.  But  the  fact  is  established  that  our 
courts  generally  are  more  than  willing  to  do  their 
duty  in  such  cases  as  are  alluded  to  in  this  discus- 
sion. Reverence  for  law  will  tend  to  the  peace 
and  safety  of  the  people,  and  it  is  right  in  the 
sight  of  God. 

The  lack  of  reverence  for  law  and  for  estab- 
lished institutions,  and  for  all  authority,  is  one  of 
the  most  salient  and  ominous  characteristics  of 
our  time. 

Audacity  is  the  word  which  may  best  character- 
ize the  spirit  of  the  age ;  and  this  audacity  is  a 
great  and  beneficent  thing  as  applied  to  the 
investigation  of  the  forces  of  nature  and  their  use 
for  the  comfort  and  service  of  men.  Steam, 
electricity,  heat,  sound,  and  chemical  affinity,  are 
proper  subjects  for  such  study,  and  under  God's 
command  to  subdue  the  earth,  man  is  right  to 
make  all  of  earth's  forces  bow  to  his  will,  to  be 
used  for  honest  purposes.  So  great  have  been 
the  achievements  of  man's  genius  in  the  depart- 
ment of  physical  science,  and  so  marvelous  are 
the  inventions  he  has  sought  out,  that  we  are  no 
longer  surprised  at  the  announcements  published 
from  time  to  time  of  new  inroads  made  upon  the 
mysteries  of  nature.  But  the  scientific  investi- 
gator will  be  safe  and  accomplish  the  most  trust- 
worthy results  only  when  he  recognizes  behind 
all  natural  phenomena  and  laws  the  impenetrable 
mystery  of  life,  the  fact  unwritten  in  the  rocks — 
that  all  things  originated  with  the  fiat  of  God; 


Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character    7 1 

that  no  event  transpires  beyond  His  authority, 
and  that  the  laws  of  nature  are  the  laws  of  God. 
Science,  to  be  true  science,  must  be  devout,  and 
bend  its  knees  before  the  throne  of  the  August 
Creator  of  the  universe. 

The  failure  to  bring  the  conclusions  of  science, 
so  far  as  they  touch  man's  moral  relations,  to  the 
test  of  the  perfect  and  unchangeable  standard  of 
God's  Word — the  only  perfect  and  unchangeable 
possession  of  man — has  led  to  many  foolish  errors. 
But  they  have  been  like  passing  mists  that  veil 
for  a  time  the  mountain's  granite  brow,  which, 
when  a  breath  comes  from  the  calm  clear  sky,  are 
swept  away  in  an  instant  and  forgotten. 

But  when  this  bold  spirit  of  investigation 
progresses  from  the  material  sphere  into  that  of 
morals,  when  it  approaches  the  social  and  reli- 
gious relations  of  men  and  the  Word  of  the  Lord, 
it  must  march  with  solemn  step,  and  with  head 
bowed  in  humble  reverence  before  the  awful 
majesty  of  God.  In  the  material  world  God  has 
not  revealed  to  us  the  laws  which  regulate  its 
phenomena,  and  has  explicitly  directed  man  to 
grapple  with  them ;  but  in  the  moral  and  religious 
sphere  we  have  no  such  orders,  for  the  reason 
that  man  has  naturally  not  sufficient  spiritual 
sense  to  enable  him  to  see  and  understand  rightly 
the  relations  he  sustains  to  his  fellow  man  and 
to  God.  Here  God  has  revealed  His  laws,  and 
with  regard  to  them,  the  utmost  use  man  can 
make  of  his  intellect  is  to  endeavor  to  ascertain 


72    Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character 

what  they  are,  to  understand  them  and  to  obey 
them,  and  to  persuade  others  to  do  likewise. 

The  Bible,  infallible  in  every  statement  and  in 
every  word  as  it  came  from  the  hands  of  divine 
penmen;  the  Bible,  which  contains  statutes  on 
which  all  right  legislation  is  based,  statutes  that 
touch  every  possible  relation  of  man  to  man,  and 
man  to  God;  the  Bible,  which  alone  tells  the 
story  of  man's  creation,  fall,  and  only  hope  of 
redemption  through  the  atonement  of  the  Christ ; 
the  Bible  is  the  supreme  constitution  of  the 
world,  never  to  be  amended,  for  the  government 
of  all  races,  nations,  the  church,  the  family  and 
the  individual.  Next  to  God  Himself,  the  Bible 
is  to  be  reverenced,  for  it  is  the  record  of  God's 
revealed  will,  which  "teaches  what  man  is  to 
believe  concerning  God,  and  what  duty  God 
requires  of  man."  There  are  some  things  that 
will  continue  long,  and  at  last  become  obsolete ; 
but  the  Bible  is  not  one  of  them.  Christ  says: 
"Heaven  and  earth  shall  pass  away,  but  my  word 
shall  not  pass  away. ' ' 

Let  us  note  a  few  instances  of  the  failure  to 
reverence  and  obey  the  moral  statutes  of  God. 
They  may  be  found  in  woman's  attempt,  or  rather 
the  attempt  of  some  women,  to  get  out  of  the 
proper  sphere  of  usefulness  assigned  by  the  great 
Law-Giver  to  the  gentler  sex.  God  has  given 
man  a  work  in  the  world  that  woman  cannot  do, 
or  safely  undertake.  So  He  has  given  woman  a 
work  that  is  impossible  to  man.     It  is  clear  from 


Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character    73 

Scripture  that  woman's  sphere  is  not  at  the  ballot 
box,  in  the  hustings,  in  the  pulpit,  or  in  any  way 
as  a  public  teacher  of  religion.  A  great  publicist 
of  our  day  has  well  said  that  "those  who  cast  the 
ballot  must  be  ready  also  to  bear  the  musket" 
when  necessity  arises.  Woman's  place  is  in  the 
quiet  sanctities  of  home,  or  in  such  employments 
as  will  not  throw  her  into  the  center  of  the  tur- 
moil of  the  world's  strife.  If  she  come  to  this,  it 
will  be  bad  for  her  and  bad  for  man ;  bad  for  her 
because  she  is  not  fitted  for  such  a  sphere,  and 
because  it  would  lead  to  the  neglect  of  her  own 
glorious  work,  which  man  cannot  do  for  her.  It 
would  be  bad  for  man  because  he  would  thereby 
lose  woman's  best  ministrations  for  himself  and 
for  the  young,  and  because  he  would  also  lose 
that  sense  of  responsibility  for  protecting  woman 
which  is  a  mainspring  of  the  noblest  chivalry  of 
manhood.  May  God  save  our  country  from  the 
revolution  of  society  which  would  surely  follow 
the  transfer  of  woman  from  the  home,  where 
indeed,  if  man  is  king,  woman  is  the  loved  and 
honored  queen,  and  where  her  womanliness  is 
cherished  as  a  sacred  thing.  The  Bible  com- 
mands indeed  that  woman  be  subject  to  man,  but 
it  also  ordains  that  husbands  shall  "love  their 
wives  even  as  Christ  loved  the  church  and  gave 
Himself  for  it."  Man  is  the  "head  of  the  woman 
and  Christ  is  the  head  of  the  church. ' ' 

The  worst  symptom  of  the  prevalent  irrever- 
ence for  law  is  in  the  matter  of  children  ceasing, 


74   Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character 

to  a  great  and  increasing  degree,  to  reverence 
their  parents.  Grant  that  it  is  largely  the  par- 
ents' fault,  but  the  fact  is  indisputable.  The 
reason  that  this  change  is  so  portentous  is 
because  childhood  and  youth  are  the  formative 
period  when  the  character  and  habits  of  life  are 
acquired,  and  if  children  do  not  learn  reverence 
for  law  as  expressed  in  parental  authority,  they 
will  seldom  learn  it  after  they  come  to  adult 
years.  If  they  do  not  honor  their  parents  it  will 
be  hard  for  them  to  learn  to  fear  God,  or  to 
revere  His  Sabbath,  His  word,  or  the  "powers 
that  be,"  which  "are  ordained  of  God." 

There  are  some  good  things  things  to  be  found 
in  the  customs  even  of  the  Chinese  Empire, 
and  one  is  the  great  reverence  shown  by  children 
to  their  parents,  whom  they  are  required  to  obey 
so  long  as  their  parents  live.  They  never  pass 
from  under  the  absolute  control  of  the  father  and 
mother.  Now,  though  this  may  be  carrying 
parental  authority  too  far,  it  is  erring  on  the  side 
of  conservatism,  and  is  probably  the  main  reason 
for  the  age  of  the  nation,  which  has  a  history 
antedating,  by  many  generations  that  of  any  other 
people,  as  an  organized  nation  now  to  be  found  on 
earth.  God  laid  His  scepter  on  the  foundation  of 
conservatism  and  reverence  for  law,  when  He 
placed  in  the  Decalogue  that  simple  command, 
"Honor  thy  father  and  thy  mother,  that  th)'  days 
may  be  long  upon  the  land  which  the  Lord  thy 
God  giveth  thee."     This  ordinance  includes  by 


Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character    7  5 

logical  inference  all  reverence  for  all  right  laws 
and  institutions ;  for  those  who  honor  their  par- 
ents will  honor  one  another  and  will  fear  God. 

Another  of  the  sad  signs  of  the  times  is  the  lack 
of  reverence  for  the  pulpit  and  for  the  holy  min- 
istry. That  this  charge  is  true  to  a  greater  or 
less  extent  in  all  communities,  it  will  not  be 
necessary  to  argue.  We  ministers  know  it,  and 
many  thoughtful  persons  not  in  the  ministry 
know  it  also.  Notwithstanding  the  fact  that  God 
has  commanded  the  people  to  obey  them  that 
have  the  rule  over  them  in  spiritual  things,  and 
that  when  a  minister  is  installed  pastor  over  a 
congregation  the  people  are  required  to  "receive 
the  word  of  truth  from  his  mouth  with  meekness 
and  love,  and  to  submit  to  him  in  the  due  exer- 
cise of  discipline,"  though  there  are  many  noble 
exceptions,  there  is  not  that  respect  shown  to 
ministers  in  general  which  their  holy  office  de- 
mands. Doubtless  it  is  hard  to  reverence  a  man 
who  is  unworthy  of  reverence,  but  we  must 
reverence  the  office.  And  it  is  generally  con- 
ceded that  our  ministers  are  men  of  learning, 
sobriety  and  godliness. 

The  constitution  of  the  church  and  the  Scrip- 
tures also  require  a  similar  regard  for  those  who 
fill  the  other  offices  of  the  church. 

There  can  be  little  doubt  but  that  the  fault  in 
this  matter  lies  in  considerable  part  not  only  in 
the  spirit  of  the  age,  but  also  in  the  conduct  of 
the  ministry  itself.     If  the  minister  do  not  re- 


76     Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character 

spect  his  holy  office  as  an  ambassador  of  God, 
how  can  he  ask  others  to  reverence  it  or  him? 
Setting  out  with  the  idea  that  to  draw  a  crowd  is 
the  most  essential  thing"  for  a  preacher,  hundreds 
of  times  the  pulpit  has  been  turned  into  a  mere 
stage  on  which  cheap  acting  and  silly  sensation- 
alism take  the  place  of  the  solemn  proclamation 
cf  God's  authoritative  message  to  man.  This 
custom,  which  is  now  so  common  in  all  parts  of 
the  land,  runs  parallel  with  the  disregard  of  the 
Bible  and  God's  Day,  connives  at  it,  indeed,  and 
also  the  decadence  of  parental  authority.  These 
are  the  two  most  important  instrumentalities — 
the  pulpit  and  the  parental  function,  ordained  of 
God  for  the  conservation  of  truth,  for  the  develop- 
ment of  character,  and  the  propagation  of  the 
kingdom  of  heaven.  We  may  well  be  concerned 
when  we  see  a  disposition  to  abdicate  their  high 
and  holy  office,  on  the  part  of  parents  and  pas- 
tors, and  a  failure  to  maintain  in  themselves  and 
others  that  reverence  for  their  transcendent  func- 
tions which  their  proper  performance  of  them 
requires 

O,  for  a  return  of  the  day  when  ministers 
generally  spent  midnight  hours  in  prayer  and 
tears,  wrestling  with  God  for  the  salvation  of 
souls  and  for  power  from  the  Holy  Ghost  to 
preach  the  living  word,  and  who  stood  in  the  pul- 
pit with  fear  and  trembling,  feeling  that  on  the 
proper  discharge  of  the  duty  of  the  hour  hung 
immortal     destinies,    and    that    for    every   such 


Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character    77 

opportunity  they  must  give  answer  at  God's  bar 
of  justice  in  the  great  day  of  judgment. 

The  argument  of  the  text  implies  that  all  gov- 
ernment is  ordained  either  directly  or  permis- 
sively  of  God,  and  that  all  disobedience,  except 
where  to  obey  man  would  be  to  disobey  God,  is 
disobedience  to  God  Himself.  This  suggests  that 
all  right  authority  is  delegated  from  the  Supreme 
Being,  which  is  a  fact  of  the  most  far-reaching 
effect,  and  wherever  believed,  must  bring  with  it 
a  feeling  of  reverence  for  authority  and  law.  If 
God  is  omnipotent,  there  can  be  no  authority 
without  His  permission.  The  best  possible  rule 
on  earth  would  be  that  of  an  absolute  monarch 
combining  in  himself  the  three  great  functions  of 
government — the  legislative,  the  executive  and 
judicial,  if  that  person  be  one  who  is  "infinite, 
eternal,  unchangeable  in  his  being,  wisdom, 
power,  holiness,  justice,  goodness  and  truth." 
There  is  one  such  person,  and  one  only — God; 
and  His  is  the  only  perfect  government.  His 
authority  is  based  upon  two  facts:  First,  that  He 
is  uncreated,  and,  second,  that  He  created  all 
things.  His  creating  the  universe  would  not 
make  it  His,  if  another  had  before  created  God. 
In  that  case  God  and  all  He  had  made  would 
belong  to  the  author  of  God's  being.  So  God  is 
the  source  of  all  authority  and  power.  If,  there- 
fore, we  disobey  the  powers  God  has  ordained,  we 
disobey  Him.  A  child  at  school  is  under  the 
authority  of  his  teacher.      Why?      Because   the 


78   Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character 

parent  has  delegated  to  the  teacher  a  part  of  his 
authority  for  a  certain  time,  and  at  a  certain 
place,  for  the  control  of  his  child.  Where  did  the 
parent  get  that  authority,  a  part  of  which  he 
delegates  to  the  school-master?  God  gave  it  to 
him,  and  he  must  account  to  God  for  the  proper 
use  of  it.  Moreover,  it  can  never  be  abdicated  in 
favor  of  any  person;  for  while  the  parent  may 
authorize  the  teacher  to  exercise  a  certain  control 
over  his  child,  the  parent  is  bound  to  select  a 
good  teacher  and  to  see  that  he  properly  dis- 
charges the  duty  laid  upon  him. 

Thus  it  is  seen  that  all  right  authority,  if  traced 
back  to  its  source,  leads  up  where  it  is  intended 
to  lead  the  soul — to  the  throne  of  the  Eternal — 
and  that  a  lack  of  reverence  for  any  right  authority 
tends  inevitably  to  irreverence  for  the  Almighty. 
This  arranges  society,  with  its  social,  civil, 
literary,  religious,  economical  and  racial  grades, 
wherein  men  stand  related  as  superiors,  inferiors 
and  equals,  in  the  form  of  a  gigantic  pyramid,  on 
the  capstone  of  which  lies  the  scepter  of  the 
omnipotent  God. 

So  every  advocate  of  order,  reverence  for  law, 
and  right  authority  is  a  helper  toward  the  main- 
tenance of  God's  government  of  the  world,  and 
every  enemy  of  right  law  and  authority  strikes  at 
the  foundations  of  the  throne  of  Jehovah. 

Those  who  rule  should  rule  in  the  fear  of  God, 
as  His  stewards,  who  must  give  account  of  their 
stewardship  to  Him;  and  those  who  serve  must 


Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character    79 

serve  "as  ever  in  their  great  Task-Master's  eye." 
How  important  for  kings  and  emperors,  for 
presidents,  for  legislators,  and  governors,  for  the 
custodians  of  the  peace,  and  for  judges  them- 
selves, to  reverence  law,  and  to  maintain  the 
solemn  dignity  of  their  respective  offices ! 

Alfred  the  Great,  of  England,  was  one  of  the 
most  remarkable  sovereigns  of  whom  history 
gives  us  any  account,  and  the  secret  of  his  mar- 
velous wisdom  in  laying  the  foundations  of  our 
Anglo-Saxon  civilization  may  be  learned  from  his 
last  address  to  his  son  and  successor,  Edward,  in 
which  he  said:  "My  son,  sit  thou  now  beside  me, 
and  I  will  deliver  thee  true  instructions.  I  feel 
that  my  hour  is  coming.  My  countenance  is  wan ; 
my  days  are  almost  done;  I  shall  go  to  another 
world,  and  thou  shalt  be  left  alone  in  all  my 
wealth.  I  pray  thee,  strive  to  be  a  father  and  a 
lord  to  thy  people.  Be  thou  the  children's  father, 
and  the  widow's  friend.  Comfort  thou  the  poor 
and  shelter  the  weak ;  and  with  all  thy  might 
right  that  which  is  wrong.  And,  Son,  govern 
thyself  by  law;  then  shall  the  Lord  love  thee,  and 
God  above  all  things  shall  be  thy  reward.  Call 
thou  upon  Him  to  advise  thee  in  all  thy  need,  and 
so  shall  He  help  thee  the  better  to  compass  that 
which  thou  wouldst. ' ' 

How  important  for  parents,  and  for  ministers 
of  religion,  to  be  grave,  sober  and  reverential, 
that  those  over  whom  they  hold  authority  may 
reverence  their  word  and  receive  it  with  meek- 


So    Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character 

ness  as  well  as  love.  To  this  end  what  shall  we 
preachers  preach?  "The  whole  counsel  of  God," 
authoritatively  proclaimed.  Not  a  half  Gospel; 
not  a  message  which  is  all  love,  long  suffering 
and  mercy;  not  mere  pleadings  for  acceptance  of 
salvation  because  it  is  good  for  the  soul  to  escape 
from  the  consequences  of  sin,  carrying  this  so  far 
as  often  to  make  the  impression  that  it  is  a  great 
kindness  to  Him  who  died  on  Calvary  for  any 
man  to  accept  His  grace.  There  is  a  Sinai  as 
well  as  a  Calvary;  there  are  thunderings  and 
lightnings  as  well  as  a  cross  of  vicarious  suffer- 
ing; and  the  very  cross  itself,  if  rightly  seen,  rep- 
resents not  God's  love  to  sinners  only,  but  His 
utter  abhorrence  of  sin,  and  there  lieth  behind  the 
cross  the  awful  fact  that  unless  we  submit  to  the 
authority  of  Christ  the  King,  we  shall  be  doomed 
to  everlasting  punishment.  We  are  not  only  to 
preach  pardon,  but  God's  sovereignty  and  eternal 
electing  decree,  by  which  He  "foreordains  what- 
ever cometh  to  pass. ' ' 

The  declaration  of  the  whole  counsel  of  God 
will  inevitably  lead  to  a  deeper  reverence  for  the 
majesty  of  His  law,  to  the  development  of  a  stur- 
dier faith,  a  more  robust  Christianity;  and  with- 
out it  there  cannot  long  continue  any  considerable 
soundness  of  doctrine  or  morality  of  life. 

Is  this  a  hard  and  forbidding  prospect?  Does  this 
present  the  kingdom  of  God  in  a  repulsive  light? 
No,  far  from  it.  Absolute  authority  in  which 
justice  and  love  are  blended  are  the  most  beauti- 


Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character   81 

ful  and  inspiring-  conception  that  can  be  pre- 
sented to  the  human  mind,  because  it  is  the  only 
governance  in  which  the  soul  can  never  be  disap- 
pointed, and  in  which  it  can  repose  perfect  and 
unquestioning  faith.  In  an  earthly  parent  the 
strength  of  his  authority  and  the  extent  of  his 
power  when  exercised  with  justice  and  love,  fas- 
cinate with  affectionate  loyalty  the  mind  of  the 
dutiful  child,  and  tighten  every  fetter  of  love. 

The  world  has  always  worshiped  authority  and 
power  when  set  against  the  government  of  God ; 
when  it  traveled  to  victory  over  the  bodies  and 
souls  of  men.  Men  have  greeted  with  slavish 
applause  those  who  "rode  through  slaughter  to  a 
throne,"  because  power  is  fascinating,  and  be- 
cause a  power  that  is  rebellion  against  God  is 
pleasing  to  their  guilty  natures.  Christ  is  pre- 
sented to  us  as  an  object  of  worship  who  has  all 
power  in  heaven  and  on  earth,  but  who  has  also 
died  to  save  those  whom  He  might  have  crushed, 
and  who  wields  omnipotence  with  absolute  wis- 
dom, justice  and  goodness,  and  truth,  but  with  a 
hand  once  pierced  for  sinners,  and  under  a  heart 
which  throbs  with  love  that  is  infinite  and  ever- 
lasting. 

The  difference  between  slaves  and  freemen  is 
not  to  be  found  alone  in  the  justice  or  injustice 
of  the  bond  that  binds  them  under  a  superior 
authority.  Men  may  be  slaves  under  a  good  and 
wise  government,  if  their  submission  be  unwilling 
and  the  government  be  the  object  of  their  hate. 


82    Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character 

God's  government  is  just  and  wise  and  good,  and 
He  will  have  submission  from  every  creature. 
Those  are  slaves  who  hate  God's  law;  those  are 
freemen  who  love  it.  Those  who  strive  to  obey 
God  lovingly  in  all  things,  but  who  fail  in  many 
things,  are  partially  happy,  but  are  the  happiest 
people  on  earth.  In  heaven  obedience  and  love 
are  perfect,  therefore  happiness  is  perfect,  and 
bliss  has  no  alloy.  Let  us  strive  to  realize  the 
highest  possibilities  of  human  happiness  on  earth, 
by  obeying  and  loving  God,  and  by  loyal  reverence 
for  law  and  authority. 

The  path  of  reverential,  loving  obedience  is  the 
upward  path  towards  heaven,  and  the  only  path 
of  peace. 

Our  God  is  the  only  God  whom  man  can  truly 
worship,  because  He  only  is  "infinite,  eternal  and 
unchangeable  in  His  being,  wisdom,  power,  holi. 
ness,  justice,  goodness  and  truth.'*  Life  lived  in 
loving  submission  to  His  beneficent  sway  is  life 
in  its  noblest,  sweetest  sphere. 

In  our  realm  of  the  material  universe  the  sun  is 
the  illuminating  and  controlling  orb.  Every 
planet  is  under  his  sway,  and  by  his  prevalent 
power  is  held  in  its  course.  If  one  of  them  could 
escape  from  this  ruling  power  it  would  wander 
into  infinite  darkness,  and  our  world,  if  inde- 
pendent of  the  sun,  would  be  lost  in  boundless 
night;  nay,  it  would  inevitably  end  in  the  catas- 
trophe of  an  awful  collision  with  some  other  lost 
world   like  itself,  by  which  every  throb  of  life, 


Greatest  Defect  in  Our  National  Character   83 

every  form  of  order  and  beauty  would  be  anni- 
hilated forever.  God  is  the  controlling  power  of 
the  spiritual  universe,  and  spiritual  life  and  hap- 
piness can  only  exist  when  the  life  of  man  or 
angel  moves  according  to  His  will. 


SHALL  ALL   THE  DENOMINATIONS 
UNITE  AND  FORM  ONE 

"THAT   THEY  ALL  MAY  BE  ONE THAT   THE  WORLD 

MAY    KNOW    THAT    THOU    HAST    SENT    ME." ST.    JNO. 

17:    21,    23. 

The  great  importance  of  unity  among  Chris- 
tians is  manifest  from  many  of  the  words  of 
Christ,  but  most  of  all  from  that  part  of  His 
solemn  prayer  recorded  in  full,  offered  just  before 
His  passion.  It  was  a  most  impressive  hour, 
lie  was  about  to  die.  His  work  of  healing,  teach- 
ing and  organizing  was  finished,  and  He  was  now 
to  ascend  the  altar  of  sacrifice  to  die  for  His 
church.  Just  before  He  enters  upon  this  tremen- 
dous ordeal  He  bows  in  prayer  for  those  He  was 
about  to  die  to  save.  He  prays  that  they  may  be 
kept  from  the  world,  that  they  might  at  last  be 
with  Him  in  glory;  and  between  these  two  peti- 
tions He  places  a  prayer  for  unity,  "that  they  all 
may  be  one" ;  giving  as  the  reason  "that  the  world 
may  know  that  Thou  hast  sent  me."  In  other 
words,  the  proof  of  the  divinity  of  Christ  was  to 
be  the  oneness  of  Christians.  This  puts  the  mat- 
ter of  unity  upon  the  highest  plane,  and  gives  it 
an  importance  that  can  hardly  be  exaggerated. 
Therefore  we  may  well  ask  how  far  the  divisions 

84 


Shall  All  Denominations  Unite  and  Form  One  85 

of  Christians  are  responsible  for  the  fact  that 
after  these  two  thousands  of  years  the  majority  of 
mankind  do  not  believe  that  Jesus  Christ  is  the 
Son  of  God.  So  there  arises  before  us  the  press- 
ing question,  "Shall  all  the  denominations  unite 
and  form  one?" 

1.  There  are  many  strong  reasons  for  union, 
showing  why  Jesus  Christ  made  so  much  of  it  in 
His  teachings,  and  exalted  it  to  such  prominence 
by  giving  it  a  central  place  in  His  sacerdotal 
prayer. 

(a)  One  reason  for  union  grows  out  of  the  waste 
of  men,  and  materials  brought  about  by  our  de- 
nominational divisions.  In  a  large  city  we  do 
not  feel  this,  nor  is  there  much  waste,  because 
there  are  enough  people  to  fill  all  the  churches. 
The  waste  is  seen  in  villages  and  rural  communi- 
ties. Here  we  often  find  in  a  population  hardly 
strong  enough  to  support  one  church  two,  three 
or  four  denominations,  each  maintaining  its  own 
separate  work.  Two,  three  or  four  men  are 
where  one  could  do  all  that  is  needful,  and  in  the 
attempt  to  support  each  their  own  church  the 
people  are  divided  into  several  rival,  sometimes 
hostile,  denominations,  not  so  much  praying  to 
God  as  preying  upon  one  another.  A  natural 
result  of  this  is  that  we  find  more  outspoken 
infidelity  in  small  communities  than  in  cities.  It 
is  because  in  small  communities  denominational 
rivalry  and  sectarianism  are  stronger  and  more 
felt  than  in  cities  where  the  churches  have  an 


86  Shall  All  Denominations  Unite  and  Form  One 

abundant  population  to  work  upon.  Wherever 
sectarianism  is  stronger  infidelity  is  more  pro- 
nounced. 

In  these  small  communities  it  will  often  be 
found  that,  no  one  denomination  being  strong 
enough  to  support  a  minister  for  his  whole  time, 
there  is  no  resident  pastor  to  supply  the  daily 
needs  of  the  people,  but  preachers  who  live  else- 
where come,  each  for  a  Sunday  in  the  month.  So 
they  have  what  they  call  a  "Methodist  Sunday," 
a  "Baptist  Sunday,"  an  "Episcopal  Sunday,"  and 
a  "Presbyterian  Sunday,"  every  month,  and  in 
months  with  five  Sundays  they  may  have  also  a 
"Disciples'  Sunday,"  a  "Lutheran,"  or  some 
other  kind  of  a  Sunday,  and  there  is  no  resident 
minister  to  work  day  by  day  among  the  sinning, 
suffering  and  dying. 

In  the  midst  of  such  a  condition  of  things  the 
question  is  a  burning  one — "Shall  the  denomina- 
tions unite  and  form  one?" 

Another  reason  for  union  lies  in  the  relations 
of  missionaries  in  the  foreign  field.  There  is 
something  in  this,  and  will  be  a  great  deal  more, 
as  missions  grow,  and  the  native  churches  get 
strong  enough  to  elbow  one  another,  when  the 
materials  for  mission  work  begin  to  become  less 
than  are  required  by  the  several  organizations. 
In  a  few  heathen  countries  this  clash  has  occurred, 
but  hitherto  there  has  been  but  little  trouble 
from  this  cause.  There  is  material  enough  for 
all,  and  so  overwhelming  is  the  mass  of  heathen 


Shall  All  Denominations  Unite  and  Form  One  87 

that  the  missionaries  forget  in  a  great  degree 
their  differences,  and  are  drawn  into  close  fellow- 
ship of  prayer,  preaching  and  work.  These 
difficulties  will  increase,  however,  as  missions 
grow  and  prosper. 

Probably  the  greatest  disadvantage  of  our  de- 
nominational divisions  is  that  they  furnish  the 
world  with  a  powerful  argument  against  Chris- 
tianity. The  world  knows  that  Christ  com- 
manded unity,  and  that  we  profess  to  serve  the 
same  Master;  so  they  ask,  "If  you  are  Christians 
why  are  you  divided?"  And  men  point  the  fin- 
ger of  scorn  at  the  church  of  Christ  separated  into 
rival  sects  which  are  often  hostile  camps  making 
as  much  war  upon  one  another  as  they  do  against 
sin. 

It  is  not  a  satisfactory  answer  for  any  denom- 
ination to  say,  "We  are  the  church  of  God;  let 
the  sects  come  back  to  the  fold."  It  is  impossi- 
ble for  any  denomination  to  persuade  mankind 
that  it  is  the  Christian  church,  for  the  simple 
reason  that  it  is  not  true.  Such  a  claim  excites 
ridicule,  and  only  makes  the  matter  worse. 

From  these  considerations  and  others  that 
might  be  adduced,  a  very  strong  argument  could 
be  made  to  prove  that  all  denominations  ought 
to  unite  and  form  one.  To  many  minds  the  argu- 
ment is  conclusive. 

2.  The  difficulties,  however,  in  the  way  of  such 
consolidation  are  neither  few  nor  small.  If  the 
proposal  be  made  to  do  this,  and  it  has  been  seri- 


88  Shall  All  Denominations  Unite  and  Form  One 

ously  made,  what  difficulties  would  be  found  in 
the  way? 

Two  possible  plans  may  be  imagined  for  this 
consolidation  of  all  Christians.  First,  that  all 
denominations,  except  one,  dissolve  and  join  the 
one  denomination  which  may  be  selected  to  sur- 
vive. One  difficulty  about  this  plan  would  be  to 
decide  which  denominations  should  be  dissolved. 
Probably  any  denomination  would  be  willing  to 
have  all  the  others  dissolve  and  join  it;  but  how 
shall  we  persuade  all  the  others  to  die?  Which 
of  them  would  consent  to  commit  li/elo  de  se"? 
Would  the  Baptists,  Episcopalians,  Methodists, 
Disciples,  Lutherans,  Presbyterians?  I  can 
speak  for  these  last-named,  and  say,  "No,  we  are 
not  prepared  to  die  as  a  denomination,  however 
well  we  may  be  prepared  to  depart  this  life  as 
individuals."  It  is  certain  that  every  other  de- 
nomination would  make  the  same  response  to  an 
invitation  to   give  up  its  corporate  existence. 

Each  one  of  us  has,  as  we  think,  a  mission 
which  we  must  fulfil;  a  history  of  which  we  are 
proud,  and  cannot  give  up;  and  certain  peculiari- 
ties of  belief  that  are  very  precious  to  our  souls. 

The  other  way  to  consolidation  would  be  for  all 
to  dissolve  and  unite  in  a  new  denomination  on 
a  compromise  creed  and  church  government.  Let 
us  see  how  this  plan  would  work,  The  compro- 
mise platform  must  not  have  in  it  anything  that 
would  seriously  offend  personal  convictions.  So 
we    should  have  to  omit  from  the   new  church 


Shall  All  Denominations  Unite  and  Form  One  89 

platform  or  constitution  infant  membership  and 
baptism  by  sprinkling,  to  please  the  Baptists ;  the 
Baptists  would  have  to  give  up  immersion  and 
close  communion,  to  please  the  Presbyterians; 
the  Congregationalists  would  have  to  forego  con- 
gregational church  government,  to  conciliate  the 
Methodists;  and  the  Methodists  must  renounce 
Episcopal  government,  to  please  the  Congrega- 
tionalists; the  Presbyterians  must  abjure  predes- 
tination for  the  sake  of  the  consciences  of  the 
Methodists ;  and  the  Methodists  Arminianism,  to 
please  the   Presbyterians. 

In  this  new  church  to  be  formed  there  must  be 
no  Calvinism,  nor  Arminianism ;  no  government 
by  bishops  nor  by  Presbyteries,  nor  by  congrega- 
tions; no  printed  prayers,  nor  extemporaneous 
prayers;  no  baptism  by  sprinkling,  nor  by  im- 
mersion ;  no  open  communion,  nor  close  commun- 
ion, and  so  on. 

Are  the  denominations  prepared  for  this? 
Would  any  one  be  pleased?  If  so,  who?  Such  a 
church  would  be  a  body  without  bones,  joints, 
organs, — a  jelly  fish,  that  could  do  nothing,  say 
nothing,  and  look  like  nothing  alive  in  the  heav- 
ens above  or  the  earth  beneath. 

The  whole  thing  is  impracticable  and  absurd. 
The  denominations  will  not  and  cannot  now  con- 
solidate. 

3.  What  is  practicable?  While  we  cannot  for 
the  present  nor  in  the  near  future  have  consoli- 
dation, we  have  already  the  most  valuable  of  all 


90  Shall  All  Denominations  Unite  and  Form  Ont 

unity — spiritual  or  organic  unity,  as  distinguished 
from  organized  unity.  A  cask  made  of  staves 
bound  together  by  iron  bands  is  an  organized 
unity;  a  vine  with  many  living  branches  united 
to  one  stem  is  an  organic  living  unity.  This  is 
what  we  have,  a  living  organic  unity. 

Let  us  act  upon  the  fact  that  we  are  one  in  liv- 
ing union  with  Christ.  "The  church  consists  of 
all  those  persons  of  every  nation  who  profess  the 
true  religion  of  Christ."  This  is  the  sublime 
truth,  and  it  is  making  its  way. 

It  must  be  manifested  by  every  denomination 
IT  as  practicable,  without  offending  the  con- 
victions of  others. 

The  Baptists  will  not  commune  with  us;  well, 
then,  let  us  exchange  pulpits  and  sing  and  pray 
together.  The  Episcopalians  cannot  ordinarily 
invite  us  to  preach  in  their  pulpits.  Well,  let  us 
invite  them  to  preach  in  ours,  and  so  let  us  go  on, 
and  wherever  it  is  possible  to  worship  or  work 
together,  let  us  do  this,  and  leave  the  rest  to 
time  and  God.  Let  every  one  of  us  exercise 
Christian  unity  in  every  practicable  way,  and 
respect  one  another's  peculiar  views. 

The  glorious  acknowledgement  of  the  church- 
ship  of  all  Christians  is  now  made  in  many  ways, 
and  will  be  made  more  and  more. 

We  all  unite  in  the  international  Sunday- 
school  work;  in  the  Young  Men's  and  Young 
Women's  Christian  Association  work,  and  in  Bible 
distribution.      We  have  just  impressed   the  world 


Shall  All  Denominations  Unite  and  Form  On 

by  a  vast  conference  of  all  evangelical  denom 
tions  in   New   York,    in  the  interests  of  foreign 
missions,  in  which  Episcopalians.  s,  Metho- 

dists, Reformed,  Disciples,  Lutherans,  Moray. 
Presbyterians,  etc.,  all  met  upon  the  platform  of 
one  common  loyalty  to  Christ,  to  discuss  the  ques- 
tion of  "How  can  we  make  the  world  believe  in 
Him-" 

Let  us  view  the  whole  situation  in  the  ligk 
this  question,  "What  would  the  denominations  do 
if   Christ    should  come?'"      If   Christ    should    be 
announced  to  hold   a  ranion   service,  which 

is  the  sacrament  of  unity,  would  any  Christians 
decline  to  commune  if  persons  came  who  had  not 
been  baptized  in  their  peculiar  way,  or  if  some 
came  who  had  not  been  confirmed  by  the  la 
on  of  a  bishop's  hands?  Hardly.  It  is  certain 
that  if  Christ  came  our  denominational  rivalries 
would  melt  like  frost  before  the  rising  sun,  and 
that  we  should  have  a  summer  of  glorious  unity 
like  that  of  heaven  itself. 

Christ  is  here  with  His  church,  though  i 
and  it  is  a  serious  question  how  to  defend  to  Him 
our  lack  of  fellowship  and  co-operation.  It  will 
not  be  possible  just  now  for  us  all  to  consolidate, 
but  it  is  practicable  for  us  to  recognize  and  show 
:  to  the  world  our  vital  oneness  in  Him  in 
many  ways.  Why  can  we  not  preach  in  each 
other's  pulpits  and  commune  together?  Why 
may  not  every  pulpit  be  open  to  every  w< 
evangelical  minister,  and  every  communion  ta1  le 


92  Shall  All  Denominations  Unite  and  Form  One 

be  open  to  every  devout  Christian?  I  seriously 
and  affectionately  urge  that  this  ought  to  be  done, 
and  that  we  unite  in  all  kinds  of  Christian  work. 
If  consolidation  is  not  feasible,  communion  and 
co-operation  are,  and  I  do  believe  that  such  a  pro- 
posal would  be  approved  and  blessed  by  the  Great 
Head  of  the  Church,  who  prayed  that  "they  all 
may  be  one. "  Christ's  prayer  was  not  for  spirit- 
ual unity,  because  that  is  a  fact  always  existent. 
Christians  are  brothers  because  they  are  born  of 
the  same  Spirit.  It  would  be  absurd  to  pray  that 
brothers  may  be  brothers.  What  He  prayed  for 
was  that  brothers  might  be  brotherly;  in  othe/r 
words,  for  a  visible  manifestation  of  the  spiritual 
unity  of  all  Christians. 

I  have  a  serious  proposal  to  make.  It  is  that 
we  form  a  great  confederation  of  independent 
and  self-governing  churches  for  the  conversion 
of  the  world,  and  that  the  basis  of  this  confeder- 
ation be  simply,  Faith  in  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  as 
the  Son  of  God  and  only  Saviour  of  men,  and  the 
Scriptures  the  infallible  rule  of  faith  and  practice. 

In  such  a  confederation  two  things  would  be 
necessary:  First,  that  all  denominations  recog- 
nize one  another  as  parts  of  the  Holy  Catholic  or 
universal  church  of  God ;  second,  that  we  create 
a  great  executive  ecumenical  assembly,  to  meet, 
say,  once  in  five  years,  with  subordinate  assem- 
blies for  each  nation,  and  subdivisions  for  each 
state  and  community,  to  meet  as  often  as  may  be 
needful,  and  that  these  assemblies,  general  and 


Shall  All  Denominations  Unite  and  Form  One  93 

local,  have  nothing-  to  do  with  doctrines  except 
the  one  basis  of  its  organization,  Christ  the  Son 
of  God  and  Saviour  of  men,  but  be  charged  with 
the  great  work  of  overseeing  in  a  general  way 
the  evangelization  of  the  world.  Under  this 
general  subject  there  would  be  such  divisions  as 
Sunday-school  work,  Bible  distribution,  Young 
Men's  and  Young  Women's  Christian  Association 
work,  home  and  foreign  mission  work,  and  sys- 
tematized charities.  In  other  words,  the  confed- 
eration of  denominations  would  have  only  exec- 
utive functions  pertaining  to  co-operation  in  the 
work  of  saving  the  world  for  Christ. 

The  consummation  of  such  a  union  as  this 
would  impress  all  mankind,  and  compel  belief 
in  the  divinity  of  ou±  i^ord.  It  would  economize 
materials  and  men ;  would  minimize  unchristian 
rivalry;  and  would,  I  believe,  be  pleasing  to 
Christ.  So,  in  reply  to  the  question,  "Shall  all 
denominations  unite  and  form  one?"  I  answer, 
Let  us  come  together  and  form  a  confederation 
of  churches,  to  "preach  the  Gospel  to  every  crea- 
ture." The  great  ecumenical  conference  of  for- 
eign missions  of  all  denominations  recently  held 
in  New  York  is  a  sign  that  the  denominations  are 
moving  in  this  direction.  God  grant  that  it  may 
prove  to  be  a  prophecy  and  that  we  may  have  a 
confederation  of  all  denominations  to  convert  the 
world  to  Christ.  Then  will  Christ's  prayer  for 
unity  be  answered,  and  the  kingdom  of  God  will 
move  forward  as  it  did  in  the  early  centuries  of 


94  Shall  All  Denominations  Unite  and  Form  One 

the  Christian  era,  which  witnessed  the  conversion 
of  the  Roman  world  in  the  space  of  three  hun- 
dred years. 

If  such  a  union  were  effected  one  glorious 
result  would  be  the  regaining  of  the  long-lost 
self-consciousness  of  the  church  of  God.  Be- 
cause of  our  divisions  the  church  has  lost  con- 
sciousness of  her  oneness,  her  corporate  individ- 
uality. She  would  then  feel  herself  to  be  indeed 
the  kingdom  of  God,  and  a  splendid  patriotism 
for  the  church  would  arise  in  the  hearts  of  its 
members,  nerving  them  for  trial,  and  inspiring 
them  to  strive  for  the  conquest  of  the  world. 


HOW  CAN  THE  CHURCH  REACH 
THE  MASSES 

"the  son  of  man  is  come  to  seek  and  to  save 
that  which  was  lost." st.  luke  19:  io. 

The  church  is  reaching  the  masses,  but  not  to 
the  extent  that  it  should.  It  is  doing  a  great 
work,  but  not  the  greatest  work  it  could  or  ought 
to  do.  After  two  thousand  years  the  majority  of 
mankind  have  not  heard  that  Jesus  Christ  is  God 
come  in  the  flesh,  that  He  has  died  for  sinners, 
risen  from  the  dead,  and  ascended  to  the  throne 
of  universal  sovereignty.  To  tell  this  to  all  man- 
kind was  the  task  assigned  to  the  church  two 
millenniums  ago,  and  it  has  not  yet  been  accom- 
plished. Hundreds  of  millions  of  heathen  have 
not  heard  the  Gospel,  and  many  millions  in 
Christian  nations  are  practically  unreached  by 
the  church. 

In  many  of  our  outlying  country  districts, 
especially  in  mountainous  regions  in  the  south 
and  west,  multitudes  live  and  die  in  a  condition 
little  better  than  savagery;  and  in  the  larger 
cities  thousands  in  sight  of  churches  never  go  to 
church.  It  is  said  that  in  New  York  City  there 
are  two  millions  of  unchurched  people.  Indeed, 
among  certain  sections  of  the  masses  there  is  a 

95 


g6      How  Can  the  Church  Reach  the  Masses 

feeling  of  animosity  towards  the  church,  and  the 
opinion  prevails  to  a  very  great  extent  that  the 
church  is  for  the  rich,  that  it  is  the  club-house  of 
the  wealthy  and  fashionable,  and  that  the  poor 
man  is  not  wanted  there.  That  there  is  some 
ground  for  this  feeling  no  unprejudiced  and 
candid  person  familiar  with  the  facts  can  deny. 
If  the  ragged  unwashed  multitude  should  invade 
our  fashionable  churches  it  is  more  than  doubt- 
ful whether  or  not  they  would  be  entirely  wel- 
come by  all  the  people  in  the  pews. 

The  church  is  severely  censured  in  this  matter 
by  persons  usually  who  do  nothing  themselves 
for  the  evangelizing  of  the  masses,  and  with  lofty 
Phariseeism  they  condemn  God's  people  because 
they  are  not  doing  all  their  duty,  while  they 
themselves  do  not  lift  a  hand  nor  spend  a  penny 
for  the  uplifting  of  their  fellow  men.  These 
wholesale  criticisms  are  unjust  to  the  church, 
and  especially  to  that  noble  body  in  all  churches 
who  lay  themselves  out  to  help  the  poor  and 
neglected. 

We  are  accused  of  building  churches  too  fine 
for  the  poor,  and  of  excluding  them  by  making 
houses  of  worship  too  elegant  for  plain  people. 
That  there  is  nothing  in  this  charge  is  evident 
from  the  fact  that  Roman  Catholic  churches  are 
among  the  costliest,  and  yet  they  are  crowded 
with  the  poorer  classes.  Indeed,  it  is  certain 
that  no  matter  how  poor  people  may  be  they  like 
a  handsome  church,  and  there  is  a  right  feeling 


How  Can  the  Church  Reach  the  Masses       97 

that  God's  house  ought  to  be  as  beautiful  as  the 
worshipers  can  make  it.  I  would  not  suggest 
that  we  build  plain,  unattractive  churches  for  the 
people,  but  rather  that  we  make  them  as  elegant 
as   possible. 

Elegant  church  buildings,  however,  will  not 
draw  the  masses.  This  is  seen  to  be  a  fact  every- 
where. Nor  will  splendid  music  attract  them. 
It  will  draw  certain  persons  of  the  upper  classes 
who  are  looking  for  entertainment,  and  who  go 
to  hear  music  in  church  on  Sunday,  with  the 
same  motive  with  which  they  would  attend  a  con- 
cert on  Monday,  and  because  there  is  no  place  of 
amusement  open  on  the  Lord's  Day.  Now,  while 
we  cannot  depend  upon  music,  no  matter  how 
costly,  to  draw  the  masses,  it  would  be  foolish  to 
suppose  that  the  masses  like  poor  music.  The 
music  should  be  of  the  best,  only  it  should  be 
churchly,  devotional  and  a  suitable  vehicle  for  the 
expression  of  the  deep  religious  feelings  of  the 
soul.  No  doubt  there  is  a  style  of  music  unsuited 
to  the  masses  or  the  classes,  which  is  intended 
more  as  an  exhibition  of  skill  than  an  offering  of 
praise  to  God.  But  there  can  be  no  objection  to 
good,  true,  well-timed  singing  of  the  hymns  of 
the  church.  Surely  "Rock  of  Ages"  and  "Jesus, 
Lover  of  My  Soul"  are  none  the  less  devotional 
if  sung  with  taste  and  true  harmony. 

Some  churches  offer  sensationalism  to  attract 
the  masses.  The  advertisement  of  startling  sub- 
jects for  sermons  and  the  introduction  of  wit  and 


98       How  Can  the  Church  Reach  the  Masses 

humor  into  the  pulpit  will  draw  a  crowd,  but 
what  kind  of  a  crowd?  A  crowd  not  of  the 
masses  but  the  silly  sensation-seekers,  not  the 
hard-handed  sons  and  daughters  of  toil ;  not  the 
outcasts  and  people  of  the  slums.  We  all  know 
that  this  is  true,  and  that  such  efforts  are  not  only 
futile  to  reach  the  masses,  but  degrading  to  reli- 
gion and  the  house  of  God.  Roman  Catholic 
churches  are  crowded,  but  who  ever  heard  of  a 
Catholic  priest  advertising  to  preach  on  sensa- 
tional topics?  To  the  credit  of  the  Roman 
Catholics  be  it  said,  they  do  maintain  the  dignity 
of  the  house  of  worship,  and  nothing  is  more 
solemn  than  a  Catholic  mass.  Indeed,  few  things 
have  more  attraction  for  men  than  a  holy  solem- 
nity. 

A  great  deal  is  said  by  critics  of  the  church 
about  the  churches  moving  uptown  away  from 
the  poor,  to  be  convenient  to  the  rich.  There  is 
not  so  much  in  this  as  many  think,  though  there 
are  cities  where  the  criticism  is  just.  In  the  city 
where  I  live  and  in  most  cities  there  is  no  ground 
for  this  accusation.  Of  course,  there  are  cases 
where  churches  must  move  uptown  because  the 
people  who  worship  in  them  move  uptown,  and 
they  desire,  very  properly,  to  have  their  church 
near  their  homes.  In  our  city  there  is  no  neigh- 
borhood without  its  church  or  churches,  and  so 
far  as  church  accommodation  and  convenience 
of  access  are  concerned,  no  person  can  say  there 
is  no  church  for  him  to  attend.     Indeed,  in  most 


How  Can  the  Church  Reach  the  Masses       99 

villages  there  are  too  many  churches,  and  the 
people  could  do  well  with  half  the  number. 

The  fault  lies  deeper  than  any  of  these  criti- 
cisms suggest.  The  masses  don't  go  to  church 
because  they  don't  wish  to,  and  the  question  is 
how  to  make  them  wish  to  go — how  to  "compel 
them  to  come  in"  by  awakening  a  desire  for  the 
worship  of  the  Lord's  house.  This  is  the  great 
question  of  how  to  reach  the  great  unchurched 
masses.  Let  it  not  be  understood  by  this  state- 
ment that  it  is  intended  to  throw  the  blame  of 
non-attendance  by  the  masses  off  from  the  church 
people,  and  entirely  upon  the  non-churchgoers. 
I  claim  that  it  rests  upon  both,  and  more  upon 
church  people  than  upon  those  who  do  not  go  to 
church.  Of  course  the  masses  do  not  want  to  go 
to  church  or  they  would  go,  but  it  is  the  duty  of 
Christians  to  make  them  zvant  to  go,  and  it  can  be 
done.  How?  The  way  to  reach  the  masses  is*  to 
go  after  them,  in  imitation  of  the  example  of  our 
blessed  Lord,  who  said,  "The  Son  of  Man  is 
come  to  seek  and  to  save  that  which  was  lost. ' ' 

The  church  makes  the  mistake  of  supposing 
it  has  done  its  whole  duty  if  it  sends  after  the 
masses.  It  is  right  and  necessary  to  employ  city 
missionaries,  and  send  them  into  the"  tenement 
house  districts  and  the  slums.  These  devoted 
workers  do  great  service,  and  are  worthy  of  the 
highest  praise,  but  they  cannot  do  all  the  church's 
work  for  the  church.  Male  and  female  lay-work- 
ers, church  visitors,   to  go  among  the  poor,  the 


ioo     How  Can  the  Church  Reach  the  Masses 

sick,  the  unchurched,  seeking  them  in  cellars, 
attics  and  on  the  streets,  by  day  and  by  night, 
are  a  necessary  part  of  the  working  force  of  a 
church  in  a  large  city.  There  is  no  estimating 
the  good  done  by  these  heroic  evangelists.  They 
deserve  all  encouragement  and  praise,  and  so  do 
the  churches  that  employ  and  support  them.  But 
these  consecrated  workers  cannot  do  all  the 
church's  work. 

It  is  so  obviously  the  duty  of  pastors,  and  so 
almost  universally  their  custom,  to  visit  from 
house  to  house,  to  seek  and  "to  save  that  which 
was  lost,"  that  no  one  has  much  to  say  about 
that.  As  a  rule  pastors  do  as  much  of  this  kind 
of  work  as  they  can  get  time  for.  There  are 
many  kinds  of  work  taxing  the  time  of  a  city 
pastor.  There  are  social  obligations  he  cannot 
shirk.  Surely  the  members  of  his  church  have 
the  first  claim  upon  his  services.  There  are 
numerous  committees  and  boards  in  which  he  is 
an  important  and  indeed  indispensable  factor. 
He  must  prepare  three  fresh,  interesting  and 
helpful  sermons  every  week.  This  requires 
time.  A  distinguished  pastor  said,  in  my  hear- 
ing, "No  man  can  prepare  more  than  one  good 
sermon  per  week."  That  may  be  true,  but  every 
pastor  must  prepare  three  sermons  per  week  that 
the  people  will  think  are  good,  or  they  will  want 
another  pastor.  To  do  this  he  must  read,  must 
study  his  professional  books,  must  keep  abreast 
with   the  literature  and  the  thought  of  the  day. 


How  Can  the  Church  Reach  the  Masses     101 

The  pastor  of  a  large  church  who  does  his  duty  in 
his  study  and  visits  once  a  year  his  own  people 
will  not  have  a  great  deal  of  time  "to  seek  and  to 
save  that  which  was  lost."  Most  of  us  do  it  to  a 
very  considerable  extent,  and'  often  to  the  neg- 
lect of  study  and  sermon  preparation.  But  if  a 
pastor  could  visit  every  unchurched  family  in 
his  parish  two  or  three  times  per  year  it  would 
not  meet  the  wants  of  the  case.  Suppose  he  does 
go  and  invite  the  people  to  church,  and  suppose 
they  come  once  or  twice,  they  will  not  continue 
to  come,  nor  will  they  feel  at  home  in  a  church 
where  they  do  not  know  the  members.  They 
are  not  sure  that  they  are  wanted  and  welcomed 
by  the  people.  Very  few  persons  will  persevere 
in  attending  a  church  where  they  make  no 
friends.  They  feel  that  they  have  a  right  to 
know  the  people  in  a  church  where  they  go. 
Persons  of  the  humbler  class  are  sensitive,  and 
properly  sensitive,  about  this  matter.  So  would 
you  be  if  you  attended  a  church  and  made  no 
acquaintances.  They  begin  to  feel  that  they  are 
not  wanted,  and  then  they  stay  away. 

The  way  to  reach  the  masses  is  for  the  church 
to  go  after  them,  and  nothing  short  of  this  will 
answer.  The  pastor  and  the  lay-worker  may  get 
people  from  the  masses  to  come  once  or  twice,  but 
if  the  church  is  to  keep  them  the  church  must  go 
after  them,  and  the  people  of  the  church  must 
become  the  friends  of  the  poor,  the  humble  and 
the  forsaken. 


102     How  Can  the  Church  Reach  the  Masses 

Despairing  of  getting  the  whole  church  to  go 
regularly  into  this  kind  of  work,  I  have  tried  with 
gratifying  success  the  plan  of  calling  for  volun- 
teers to  meet  in  the  lecture  room  after  Sunday 
morning  service  to  undertake  to  visit  among 
backward  members,  strangers,  the  poor,  and  non- 
churchgoers,  not  sending  them  to  any  house 
where  I  had  not  already  been.  About  seventy- 
five  came  in  response  to  my  call,  and  I  divided 
them  into  six  companies  according  to  sex  and 
age,  appointing  a  chairman  for  each,  giving  to 
these  chairmen  lists  of  persons  for  each  company 
to  call  on.  It  worked  well,  and  most  gratifying 
results  were  accomplished.  One  of  these  com- 
panies, the  young  men,  in  addition  to  visiting 
young  men,  were  directed  to  put  church  invita- 
tions in  the  letter  boxes  of  guests  at  hotels.  The 
attendance  on  the  services  increased  twenty-five 
per  cent  immediately.  In  visiting  persons  to 
whom  I  sent  them,  my  companies  also  found  out 
many  other  persons  and  families  of  whom  I  had 
not  heard.  These  they  called  on  also,  and  so  did 
I,  sending  the  other  companies  to  visit  them. 
For  example:  Here  is  a  new  family.  I  send  the 
company  of  adult  ladies  to  call  on  the  mother,  the 
adult  men  to  call  on  the  father,  the  young  men  to 
call  on  the  young  men,  the  young  ladies  to  call  on 
the  young  ladies,  and  the  boys'  and  girls'  com- 
panies to  call  on  the  boys  and  girls  and  to  go,  on 
Sunday  morning,  to  bring  them  to  Sunday-school. 

The  plan  proving  a  success,  more  members  of 


How  Can  the  Church  Reach  the  Masses     103 

the  church  joined  the  "Church  Workers,"  as  the 
whole  band  was  named. 

The  reason  it  is  necessary  for  the  people  to  go 
after  the  people  is  that  people  love  love.  The 
most  popular  thing  is  love.  All  men  and  women 
love  to  be  loved.  Love  will  draw  people,  and  it 
is  the  only  thing  that  will.  "Faith,  hope,  love, 
but  the  greatest  of  these  is  love. '  ■  Make  a  man 
feel  that  you  love  him,  and  he  will  let  you  lead 
him.  It  gives  him  an  uplift,  and  produces  both 
faith  and  hope.  Love  is  the  mother  grace ;  and 
faith  and  hope  are  her  children.  If  people  of 
the  church  show  those  not  of  the  church  that  they 
love  them,  faith  will  come.  They  will  believe 
in  you,  in  the  church,  and  that  there  is  some- 
thing in  religion  after  all.  It  will  help  them  to 
believe  in  God.  Then  hope  will  come.  They 
will  begin  to  hope  for  a  better,  more  beautiful 
and  happier  life,  and  a  future  will  open  before 
those  who  before  had  no  future,  but  whose  lives 
were  lived  under  a  dead  and  hopeless  monotony. 
Many  a  sluggish  life  has  been  awakened  in  this 
way  by  the  quickening  touch  of  love. 

Now  we  come  to  an  argument  that  cannot  be 
disputed — the  precept  and  example  of  Christ 
He  sent  His  disciples  "to  seek  and  to  save,"  and 
He  went  Himself  on  the  same  blessed  mission. 
In  the  four  inspired  biographies  of  our  Lord,  we 
have  comparatively  little  about  His  preaching  to 
great  audiences.  The  greater  part  of  the  record 
has  to  do  with  Christ's  visiting.     He  went  about 


104     How  Can  the  Church  Reach  the  Masses 

doing  good.  He  visited  the  poor,  the  humble, 
the  sinful,  the  outcast,  the  despised,  and  when 
He  healed  the  sick  "He  laid  His  hands  on  every- 
one of  them." 

This  the  church  must  do  if  she  would  succeed. 
She  must  lay  her  hands  on  every  one  of  them — the 
people  she  would  save.  Christ  sought  men ;  He 
did  not  wait  for  them  to  seek  Him.  He  might 
have  established  Himself  in  Capernaum  or  Jeru- 
salem and  sent  out  advertisements  inviting  all  to 
come  and  be  saved.  But  this  was  not  His  way ; 
He  went  after  the  people.  Remember  the  para- 
ble of  the  great  supper.  When  the  invited 
guests  would  not  come,  He  sent  His  servants  out 
into  "the  highways  and  hedges"  to  seek  the  poor, 
the  lame,  the  halt  and  the  blind,  to  "compel 
them  to  come  in,"  and  they  came.  Here  is  the 
model  for  the  church. 

Men  have  puzzled  their  minds  to  try  to  under- 
stand why  the  people  were  so  drawn  to  Christ. 
There  is  no  mystery  about  it.  They  were  drawn 
to  Him  because  He  loved  them.  This  was  the 
power  of  His  mission.  Men  followed  Him  not 
because  He  was  the  Son  of  God,  at  first,  for  they 
did  not  know  that  clearly,  if  at  all,  but  they  came 
because  they  loved  Him,  and  they  loved  Him 
because  He  first  loved  them. 


CAN  WE  DO  ANYTHING  IMMORTAL 

"forasmuch  as  ye  know  that  your  labor  is 
not  in  vain  in  the  lord." 1  cor.  15  :  58. 

We  are  workers.  Work  is  the  first  destiny  of 
man.     We  are  partners  in  the  universal  toil. 

Most  prominent  of  all  things  is  work.  We  have 
parks  and  places  for  play,  a  few,  in  our  cities, 
but  the  places  of  work  are  without  number.  There 
is  more  of  work  in  ,the  world  than  of  any  other 
thing.  On  how  many  fields  are  men  following 
the  plow?  In  how  many  forests  are  they  wield- 
ing the  ax?  In  how  many  mines  are  they  dig- 
ging coal,  iron,  and  precious  metals?  In  how 
many  factories  are  they  toiling  among  dizzying 
wheels?  It  is  work,  work,  everywhere,  by  all 
people,  from  day  to  day.  So  great  is  the  toil  of 
the  world  that  God  interposes  one  day  in  seven, 
and  calling  a  halt,  bids  men  rest.  Otherwise  they 
could  not  stand  the  strain.  It  all  came  in  with 
that  sentence  which  carries  a  blessing  in  its 
hand,  "In  the  sweat  of  thy  face  shalt  thou  eat 
bread."  Man  must  work  to  live,  and  he  lives  to 
work,  until  ax,  hammer,  hoe,  pen,  fall  from  the 
hand  unnerved  by  death. 

Work  is  noble.  In  its  widest  sense,  it  is  the 
greatest  thing,  and  he  who  will  not  work  deserves 

105 


106  Can  We  Do  Anything  Immortal 

not  to  eat.  He  who  does  the  most  work,  the  best 
work,  is  the  true  patrician,  a  nobleman  of  a 
divine  order  of  nobility,  for  he  places  himself  in 
line  with  Him  who  is  the  greatest  worker,  who 
never  sleeps;  and  with  His  Son  who  was  the 
Prince  of  workers,  who  said,  "I  must  work  while 
it  is  called  to-day." 

An  old  philosopher  said,  "Know  thyself,"  but 
a  modern  teacher  says,  "Better  than  that  is,  to 
know  thy  work  and  do  it"  (Thomas  Carlyle). 

There  is  one  sad  fact,  however,  connected  with 
work,  and  that  is  the  temporary  character  of  its 
results.  They  don't  last.  The  worker  and  the 
work  pass  away.  The  painter  at  his  easel,  the 
sculptor  with  his  statue,  the  architect  with  his 
building,  each  is  saddened  by  the  thought  that 
the  thing  he  toils  over  and  is  putting  his  life  into 
will  crumble  some  day  and  turn  to  dust.  Men 
are  constantly  endeavoring  to  do  something,  or 
to  make  something  that  will  endure.  Painters, 
sculptors,  poets,  historians,  philosophers,  states- 
men, architects,  have  done  their  great  things  in- 
spired by  a  desire  to  make  something  lasting. 
This  has  held  them  at  their  posts  of  toil  where 
mind  and  hand  combined  to  attempt  the  im- 
mortal. 

But  the  mournful  fact  is  that  every  such  at- 
tempt is  doomed  to  failure.  None  of  them  has 
ever  made  an  immortal  thing.  Men  know  this 
when  they  think,  and  the  joy  of  successful  effort 
is  shadowed  with  the  irrepressible  thought  that 


Can   We  Do  Anything  Immortal         107 

what  has  been  done  at  su^h  cost,  of  thought, 
labor,  and  tears,  must  some  time  pass  away  and 
perish.  A  few  of  the  works  of  ancient  art  have 
been  dug  up  from  the  ruins  of  the  past,  but  only 
to  survive  a  while.  The  greater  part  of  the  art 
of  Greece,  Rome,  and  Egypt  has  utterly  perished, 
while  of  Babylon  and  Nineveh  we  have  practi- 
cally nothing  left. 

Is  there  no  help  for  this,  and  did  God  intend 
the  mightiest  of  all  instincts  in  man,  the  instinct 
for  the  doing  of  an  immortal  thing,  should  be 
never  gratified,    should  always  be  disappointed? 

That  is  the  final  conclusion  of  worldly  phi- 
losophy. So  the  poetry,  the  romance,  the  political 
science  of  the  world  is  pessimistic.  Unillumi- 
nated,  uninspired  philosophy  has  reasoned  for 
thousands  of  years,  and  its  final  conclusion  is 
that  beyond  this  world  we  know  nothing,  that  all 
ends  here  and  ends  soon.  In  other  words,  that 
the  goal  of  all  things  is  nothingness  and  oblivion. 

On  this  theory  philosophy  is  right  to  make  little 
of  life,  little  of  joy,  sorrow,  sin,  holiness,  and  to 
look  with  a  disdainful  smile  upon  the  strife  and 
struggle  of  the  world.  If  all  ends  in  nothingness 
it  is  logical  to  say,  let  us  eat,  drink,  sin,  do  what 
we  will,  for  to-morrow  we  die,  and  all  we  do  dies 
with  us.  In  this  view,  virtue,  honesty,  charity, 
integrity,  self-denial  are  a  mistake.  And  worldly 
philosophy,  on  the  premises  it  starts  out  with,  is 
right. 

But  are  the  premises  right?     Is  there  no  im- 


108  Can   We  Do  Anything  Immortal 

mortal  thing  that  man  can  do?  Is  there  no  work 
that  will  endure?     Yes,  there  is;  let  us  see. 

Work  done  for  God  is  immortal.  The  mis- 
take men  make  is  in  putting  self  in  place  of  God, 
and  working  for  that.  Put  God  in  place  of  self, 
and  everything  done  for  Him  is  immortal.  God 
lets  nothing  die  that  is  done  for  Him.  Immor- 
tality of  work  is  God's  gift  to  human  workers  as 
a  reward  for  loyal  service. 

Here,  in  opposition  to  worldly  pessimism,  is 
the  glorious  optimism  of  the  divine,  and  eternal. 
So  thus  we  see  that  no  work  need  be  mortal,  but 
all  may  be  immortal.  It  means  that  one  who 
builds  a  house  for  God ;  carves  a  statue  for  God ; 
paints  a  picture  for  God;  gives  a  cup  of  cold 
water  for  God;  drops  two  mites  into  the 
treasury  of  God,  has  done  a  thing  that  shall  en- 
dure forever  more.  It  means  that  every  man 
may  do  things,  may  do  all  his  things,  in  such  a 
way  that  they  shall  outlast  the  stars  and  con- 
tinue as  long  as  God  is  God. 

This  is  the  true  philosophy  of  the  immortality 
of  work;  and,  carried  out  in  life,  lights  up  all 
toil,  making  it  shine  with  a  prophetic  lustre,  and 
eliminates  the  saddest  thought  of  the  heart — the 
thought  of  loss,  for  hereby  there  is  no  such  thing 
as  loss.  Living  thus  no  man  can  lose  anything 
except  his  sins.  "Man's  chief  end  is  to  glorify 
God,"  and  the  natural,  the  divine  consequence  is 
"to  enjoy  Him  forever." 

So  the  widow's  two  mites  have  not  been  lost, 


Can   We  Do  Anything  Immortal         109 

though  the  empires  of  Alexander  and  Caesar  are 
lost.  The  widow's  deed  was  immortal  because 
done  for  God;  the  empires  of  the  world's  two 
great  ancient  conquerors  are  lost  because  done  for 
themselves. 

This  makes  small  deeds  great,  and  humble 
service  glorious. 

There  was  a  poor  maker  of  harps  in  Athens 
who  took  great  pains  in  constructing  one  partic- 
ular harp,  so  much  so  that  his  friends  asked 
him  why  he  took  such  unusual  pains;  and  he 
answered,  "This  harp  is  for  Thales,  the  great 
harper;  he  will  play  upon  its  strings."  So  the 
humblest  worker  may  say,  "I  take  pains  to  do 
this  thing  because  it  is  for  God;  He  will  use  it  for 
a  glorious  purpose."  Make  a  harp  for  God. 
Paint  a  picture  for  God.  Carve  a  statue  for  God. 
Yes,  plow  a  field  for  God;  keep  a  store,  run  a 
bank,  keep  a  kitchen  clean,  teach  a  Sunday- 
school  class,  give  a  cup  of  cold  water  for  God, 
and  )^ou  are  doing  an  immortal  thing. 

A  young  man  who  had  little  thought  for  reli- 
gion was  sitting  alone,  lost  in  reverie.  A  friend 
passing  by  stooped  to  whisper  in  his  ear,  "Eter- 
nity," just  that  one  word,  and  went  on  his  wayt 
But  that  word  and  what  it  meant  lifted  his  soul 
to  God,  and  he  became  a  Christian. 

Now  those  who  read  this  are  thinking  of  the  great 
hereafter,  and  of  the  preservation  of  good  deeds 
in  the  album  of  God's  unfailing  memory.  Well, 
this  is  true,  but  this  is  not  all  the  truth  cf  the 


no  Can   We  Do  Anything  Immortal 

immortality  of  work  done  for  God.  Nor  does 
this  quite  meet  the  instinct,  the  desire  for  im- 
mortal deeds.  We  live  in  this  world,  we  are  a 
part  of  it,  and  we  are  not  satisfied  with  immor- 
tality outside  this  world.  We  wish  to  do  some- 
thing which  will  be  immortal  here.      We  can. 

Do  you  believe  in  the  scientific  doctrine  of  the 
conservation  of  force?  What  is  the  doctrine  of 
the  conservation  of  force?  It  is  that  force  is 
not  lost.  Heat  turns  to  electricity,  electricity  to 
light,  and  light  turns  again  to  that  which '  makes 
heat — that  no  ounce  of  force  is  wasted  or  can  be 
lost.  Force  may  change  its  form,  but  it  is  still 
force,  and  may  be  used  again  a  thousand  times. 
A  ray  of  sunshine  falls  upon  a  leaf.  It  is  not 
lost,  but  in  the  leaf  it  lives ;  into  the  tree  it  goes, 
and  some  day  will  have  a  part  in  driving  an  en- 
gine that  draws  a  train,  runs  a  factory,  or  sends 
a  ship  across  the  sea.  Coal  dug  up  from  the 
mines  is  but  preserved  force,  from  sunbeams 
that  fell  upon  the  earth  thousands  of  ages  ago. 

This  is  just  as  true  in  the  moral  world.  Moral 
force  is  imperishable.  "Kind  words  can  never 
die,"  the  song  of  our  childhood  is  the  philosophy 
of  the  conservation  of  moral  forces.  No  good 
deed  is  lost.  It  lives  because  it  is  good,  and  be- 
cause all  good  is  of  God.  Every  good  deed  adds 
to  the  assets  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  and  adds  to 
the  moral  momentum  of  the  world.  Every  good 
deed  makes  the  world  just  that  much  better,  and 
therefore  makes  mankind  just  that  much  happier. 


Can   We  Do  Anything  Immortal  in 

None  is  lost.  Even  the  things  that  seemed  to  be 
failures  were  not  lost.  Take  for  example  the 
unused  spices  brought  to  the  empty  tomb  of 
Christ,  have  they  been  lost?  Nay,  millions  of 
persons  since,  whose  spices  have  gone  apparently 
unused  have  been  comforted  and  inspired  by  the 
spices  that  were  prepared  for  the  embalmment 
of  Christ's  body. 

Good  deeds  propel  the  life  of  mankind  upward, 
God  ward,  heavenward,  and  He  who  is  their  father, 
begot  them  for  immortality,  first  in  time  and 
then  in  eternity. 

But  how  can  I  do  anything  for  God?  I  can- 
not see  Him,  nor  does  He  need  anything.  Has  God 
no  representative  on  earth?  Has  He  no  great 
scheme  here  upon  which  He  has  set  His  heart? 
Something  by  helping  which  we  do  a  service  to 
Him?     Yes;  what  is  it? 

Now  let  us  not  give  a  vague  answer  and  say,  it 
is  the  sum  of  goodness,  the  happiness  of  man- 
kind, or  that  we  must  just  live  straight  towards 
Him  as  He  is  in  heaven.  There  is  a  more  concrete 
answer,  an  answer  which  good  people  having  so 
often  failed  to  find,  has  thrown  confusion  into 
life  and  into  religion. 

I  give  you  an  answer  which  may  surprise  you 
a  little,  until  you  have  thought  about  it ;  then  it 
will  not  surprise  you  at  all.  My  answer  is,  the 
church. 

The  church  is  the  thing  God  has  in  this  world 
as  His  representative,  the  highest  object  of  His 


ii2  Can   We  Do  Anything  Immortal 

love,  outside  the  holy  Trinity.  The  world  exists 
for  the  church.  All  predestination  of  love,  all 
providence,  all  we  know  of  God  is  for  the  church, 
and  the  church  is  the  greatest  thing  in  the 
universe  except  God.  It  is  called  the  Bride  of 
Christ,  the  Temple  of  God,  and  God's  Kingdom, 
yea,  and  the  body  of  Christ.  Christ  is  a  part  of 
the  church,  its  head,  for  it  is  His  body. 

Now  I  say  that  the  most  obvious  way  to  work 
for  God  is  to  work  for  the  church,  and  all  work 
done  for  Him  is  for  His  church.  Of  course  I 
mean  the  Holy  Catholic  or  universal  church, 
consisting  of  all  believers  and  their  children. 
Here  is  the  only  universal  empire,  one  and  the 
same  in  all  ages  and  both  worlds. 

It  will  not  affect  this  view  to  urge  that  we  must 
work  for  the  salvation  of  souls.  For  to  save  a 
soul  is  but  to  add  one  more  to  the  church.  The 
aim  of  God  is  the  building  of  a  church,  "a  glo- 
rious church. ' '  For  this  Christ  died,  and  for  this 
object  He  lives.     Who  can  deny  it? 

Would  that  all  Christians  had  a  proper  concep- 
tion of  the  church,  the  kingdom  of  God,  the  only 
immortal  product  of  time,  that  which  shall  be 
the  residuum  of  the  universe  when  heavens  and 
earth  shall  pass  away.  When  we  labor  for  the 
church  we  are  co-workers  with  God  in  that  which 
is  nearest  His  heart. 

By  reason  of  denominational  divisions  which 
have  come,  and  must  be,  under  the  providence 
of  God,  the  church  has  almost  lost  her  self-con- 


Can   We  Do  Anything  Immortal  113 

sciousness  and  the  idea  of  the  church  as  one  great 
organism,  divine  and  everlasting,  has  well-nigh 
perished  from  the  minds  of  men.  We  may  main- 
tain our  denominational  divisions  until  God  wills 
it  otherwise,  and  yet  be  one,  and  feel  that  we  are 
one.  "2j  pluribus  unnm"  "one  among  many," 
is  the  motto  of  the  republic.  Let  it  be  so  also  in 
the  kingdom  of  God. 

Our  highest  patriotism  should  be  for  the 
church  of  God;  it  is  our  native  country.  "It 
shall  be  said  of  Zion,  this  and  that  man  was  born 
in  her." 

For  her  my  tears  shall  fall, 

For  her  my  prayers  ascend, 

To  her  my  cares  and  toils  be  given, 

Till  toils  and  cares  shall  end. 

So  I  like  the  name  churchman  in  its  broadest, 
highest  sense.  I  am  an  American,  but  I  hope  I 
am  more  a  churchman. 

How  can  we  best  serve  the  Holy  Catholic 
Church?  Answer:  By  serving  your  part  of  it. 
The  best  Presbyterian  will,  among  Presbyte- 
rians, be  the  best  Christian.  The  best  Episco- 
palian will,  among  Episcopalians,  be  the  best 
Christian,  and  so  on,  the  man  who  best  serves 
his  own  church  will  best  serve  the  Holy  Church 
of  God. 

Now  the  best  way  to  serve  the  church  at  large 
is  to  serve  your  own  particular  church  or  congre- 
gation. Love  it,  labor  to  make  it  strong,  work 
for  it,  pray  for  it,   give  to  it,   and  scrupulously 


ii4  Can   We  Do  Anything  Immortal 

attend  all  its  services.  Inform  yourself  as  to  its 
history,  and  its  principles  of  doctrine  and  govern- 
ment, and  be  ready  to  give  a  reason  for  the  faith 
that  is  in  you. 

In  conclusion  let  me  say  the  best  way  to  do  im- 
mortal things,  the  best  way  to  serve  God,  the 
best  way  to  serve  the  church  universal,  is  to  be  a 
faithful  devoted  member  of  the  particular  church 
to  which  you  belong. 

So  shall  we  help  best  to  build  the  everlasting 
temple  of  God.  The  Cologne  cathedral  that  lifts 
itself  like  an  arch-angel  of  stone  beside  the 
Rhine,  was  five  hundred  years  in  building.  Into 
it  were  worked  the  thought  and  toil  of  thousands 
of  men.  But  here  beside  the  stream  of  time  God 
has  a  temple  building  through  millenniums.  Men 
are  its  builders  in  co-work  with  Christ.  All 
things  built  into  it  are  immortal.  When  the 
world  ends  it  shall  be  complete,  and  He  who  was 
first  the  Architect  of  the  material  universe  shall 
see  this  second  greater  structure  completed,  and 
angels,  who  as  sons  of  God  shouted  for  joy  at  the 
completion  of  the  material  universe,  shall  sing 
the  dedication  hymn  of  this  most  splendid  thought 
and  plan  of  God. 

So  we  see,  the  treasury  of  immortality  is  the 
church  of  God,  and  no  work  is  truly  immortal  un- 
less built  into  its  walls.  "  Therefore,  my  beloved 
brethren,  be  ye  steadfast,  unmovable,  always 
abounding  in  the  work  of  the  Lord ;  forasmuch  as 
ye  know  that  your  labor  is  not  in  vain  in  the  Lord. ' ' 


Can   We  Do  Anything  Immortal  115 

At  the  end  of  time  the  hour  of  the  great  un- 
veiling shall  come.  An  arch-angel  shall  say, 
44 Time  is,  time  was,  but  time  shall  be  no  longer," 
and  shall  draw  away  time,  the  veil  that  covered 
the  immortal  temple.  Then  shall  the  church, 
stand  in  her  imperial  majesty,  her  high  arches 
resounding  with  praise,  and  luminous  with  the 
presence  of  Him  who  said,  "This  is  my  rest  for- 
ever ;  here  will  I  dwell. ' ' 


WHAT   IS  THE  CONNECTION   BE- 
TWEEN   DOCTRINE    AND    WORK 

"therefore." — i.  cor.    15;  58. 

There  is  a  practice  among  preachers,  very  com- 
mon but  not  to  be  commended,  of  taking  a  pas- 
sage or  word  from  the  Scriptures  and  using  it  for 
an  entirely  different  purpose  from  that  intended 
by  the  inspired  writer.  This  practice  a  great 
master  of  theology  was  accustomed  to  call  "sacred 
punning."  The  preacher  should  preach  the 
Word  of  God,  endeavoring  to  ascertain  what  is 
the  mind  of  the  Spirit,  and  to  enforce  the 
thought  of  the  text,  applying  it  to  the  life  of 
man. 

In  taking  the  word  which  engages  our  attention 
we  purpose  to  use  it  according  to  the  intention 
of  the  Apostle  Paul,  and  of  the  Holy  Spirit  who 
inspired  his  writing.  Such  particles  of  speech 
are  usually  considered  unimportant  and  insig- 
nificant, and  little  account  taken  of  them.  But 
the  use  made  of  them,  and  the  places  occupied  by 
them  in  an  argument  or  even  in  a  narrative,  often 
gives  them  great  significance,  especially  when 
they  occur  in  the  sacred  volume  where  every 
word,   as   it   came  from   the  hands  of   the  holy 


Connection  Between  Doctrine  and  Work     117 

penman,  was  inspired  of  the  Eternal  Spirit  of 
truth. 

There  has  been  always  a  tendency  to  divorce 
doctrine  and  life,  in  the  thought  and  conduct  of 
men.  One  class  of  persons  attaching  little  im- 
portance to  doctrine,  and  the  other  to  practice ; 
both  classes  failing  to  recognize  the  inevitable 
relation  between  what  a  man  believes  and  what 
he  does.  The  text  is  a  connecting  link  by  which 
St.  Paul  binds  the  great  doctrines  of  the  Gospel 
to  the  daily  life  of  men. 

We  cannot  contend  too  earnestly  for  the  estab- 
lishment and  maintenance  of  the  truth.  Sound- 
ness in  the  faith  is  an  ideal  towards  which  all 
preachers  must  strive  and  which  all  hearers 
should  endeavor  to  obtain.  God  has  not  revealed 
to  us  the  laws  of  nature.  Only  the  single  fact 
of  the  creation  of  all  things  by  the  Almighty  out 
of  nothing,  and  the  order  in  which  they  were 
created.  Man  is  left  to  search  out  natural  laws 
and  to  apply  them  to  his  use.  But  there  is  little 
connection,  if  any,  between  a  right  understand- 
ing of  natural  philosophy  and  a  virtuous  and 
honest  life.  A  man  may  be  a  good  citizen,  nay, 
a  devout  Christian,  and  yet  be  utterly  ignorant 
of  the  sciences  of  chemistry,  geology,  botany, 
and  astronomy.  He  may  ride  in  our  electric 
railway  carriages  without  the  faintest  conception 
of  the  method  of  their  operation,  and  yet  live  a 
life  acceptable  to  God  and  man. 

But  it  is  not  so  in  religion.    God  has  not  left  us 


1 1 8     Connection  Between  Doctrine  and  Work 

to  find  out  for  ourselves  the  great  facts  and  laws 
of  the  moral  world;  and  for  two  reasons:  Be- 
cause, first,  a  knowledge  of  the  most  important 
of  them  is  absolutely  necessary  to  the  right  living 
and  to  the  salvation  of  the  soul;  and,  second, 
because  man  is  incapable,  without  assistance 
from  on  high,  of  ascertaining  the  great  truths 
about  God's  nature,  and  how  man  can  be  made 
just  with  God.  So  the  beneficent  Father  of  all 
men  has  revealed  to  us  in  the  Scriptures  "what 
man  is  to  believe  concerning  God,  and  what  duty 
God  requires  of  man."  The  completeness  of 
this  revelation,  and  the  pains  God  has  taken  to 
give  it  to  us,  are  proof  enough  that  it  is  of  the 
utmost  importance  to  the  world.  In  view  of  this 
many  persons,  especially  among  the  authorized 
teachers  of  the  church,  have  devoted  themselves 
almost  exclusively  to  the  enforcement  of  doctrine 
upon  those  whom  they  were  appointed  to  in- 
struct. Their  lectures,  writings,  and  sermons 
have  ignored  everything  but  doctrine;  and  they 
have  made  orthodoxy  the  one  thing  needful.  It 
is  one  thing  needful,  but  not  the  only  thing  need- 
ful. In  a  public  teacher,  and  for  the  private 
member  of  the  church,  it  is  important  and  desir- 
able, yea,  necessary  to  his  best  growth,  that  he 
should  be  sound  in  every  point  of  theology,  but 
in  order  to  obtain  his  salvation  it  is  not  absolutely 
necessary  that  he  should  know  anything  but 
Christ  and  Him  crucified.  He  may  never  have 
heard  of  such  doctrinal  statements  as  are  indi- 


Connection  Between  Doctrine  and  Work     119 

cated  by  the  words,  imputation,  regeneration  and 
effectual  calling,  and  yet  may  lead  a  sober, 
righteous  and  godly  life. 

Preaching  doctrine  to  the  exclusion  of  morals 
tends  to  produce  a  hard  impression  of  religion 
and  to  form  hard  and  forbidding  characters  in 
whom  little  of  the  milk  of  human  kindness  is 
found;  nay,  it  does  not  always  promote  a  pure 
and  holy  life.  But,  beside  morals  and  theology, 
there  is  the  great  need  of  adapting  the  blessed 
truths  of  the  Gospel  to  the  sorrows  of  men. 
What  a  world  of  woe  is  this  in  which  we  live ! 
Who  can  compute  the  tears  it  sheds  even  in  one 
day?  All  men  have  their  griefs,  their  disap- 
pointments, doubts,  fears,  losses,  bereavements. 
God  commands,  "Comfort  ye,  comfort  ye  my 
people";  and  the  Lord  Jesus  said,  "Let  not 
your  heart  be  troubled;"  "Weep  not;"  "Come 
unto  me,  all  ye  that  labor  and  are  heavy  laden, 
and  I  will  give  you  rest."  And  as  He  stood  by 
the  tomb  of  His  friend  at  Bethany  it  is  chroni- 
cled, "Jesus  wept."  He  preached  the  glorious 
truths  of  His  Word  to  men  as  a  Comforter.  His 
very  life  was  an  application  of  truth  to  human 
conditions.  In  Him  all  truth  and  humanity  met 
and  were  blended. 

Great  clouds  with  abundant  rain  in  their 
bosom  if  they  withhold  their  gracious  treas- 
ure, and  thus  float  over  the  withering  herbage  of 
the  sun-dried  and  parched  fields,  only  mock  the 
want  which  they  do  not  relieve.     To  be  a  real 


120    Connection  Between  Doctrine  and  Work 

blessing  they  must  open  their  bosoms  and  send 
down  upon  drooping  tree  and  flower,  and  upon 
thirsting  men,  their  precious  showers.  The  con- 
nection must  be  made  between  the  need  and  the 
supply.  The  great  truths  of  God's  Word  must 
be  ever  preached,  but  we  must  also  say — "there- 
fore." God  is  great;  God  is  good;  Christ  is 
divine;  He  has  died  for  us;  we  are  immortal,  and 
our  bodies  shall  at  last  be  raised  from  the  dead ; 
but  shall  we  stop  with  that?  No;  say  also, 
"therefore,"  obey  God;  therefore  believe  in 
Christ;  therefore  live  a  holy  life;  therefore  be 
comforted,  ye  that  mourn ;  therefore  preach  the 
Gospel  and  extend  the  kingdom  of  heaven. 

On  the  other  hand,  there  are  many  who 
attach  little  value  to  the  great  doctrines  of  our 
holy  religion.  They  show  a  lofty  contempt  for 
theology,  for  creeds,  and  catechisms.  What  have 
these  things  to  do  with  helping  the  poor,  with  a 
man  living  an  honest  life?  "It  makes  no  differ- 
ence what  a  man  believes  if  he  be  sincere." 
This  is  a  great  mistake.  Experience  as  well  as 
Scripture  shows  that  to  make  men  honest  they 
must  be  taught  the  truth ;  that  the  only  founda- 
tion for  noble  character  is  principles,  and  great 
moral  truths  accepted.  No  building  can  be 
stronger  than  its  foundation,  and  if  the  founda- 
tion be  sand,  the  building  will  tumble  to  ruins 
and  be  destroyed.  Some  years  ago  a  distin- 
guished minister  organized  a  congregation  to 
hear  him  preach  morals  without  theology  or  doc- 


Connection  Between  Doctrine  and  Work     121 

trine.  Being  a  man  of  oratorical  power,  he  held 
large  crowds  spellbound  under  his  eloquence.  A 
short  time  ago  he  died,  and  within  a  week  it  was 
announced  that  his  congregation  had  been  dis- 
banded. They  had  no  great  doctrinal  beliefs, 
the  common  acceptance  of  which  would  have 
held  them  together.  If  a  church  based  on  doc- 
trines should  lose  its  pastor  would  it  be  dissolved? 
No;  the  question  of  dissolution  would  not  be 
thought  of.  The  people,  held  together,  not  by 
the  personal  attachment  to  a  man,  but  by  loyal 
adherence  to  the  great  doctrines  of  religion, 
would  still  come  together  to  worship  God. 
They  would  secure  regular  ministrations  of 
the  Word  and  as  soon  as  practicable  another 
pastor. 

Contrast  the  conditions  of  two  men  in  misfor- 
tune, one  of  whom  has  a  creed  and  the  other  not. 
The  man  who  believes  something,  and  knows 
something  to  believe,  may  lose  his  health,  his 
property,  yea,  he  may  feel  the  foundations  of  life 
itself  slipping  away  from  under  his  feet,  and  yet, 
observe,  he  is  not  in  despair.  His  best  posses- 
sions are  still  left  to  him.  The  things  of  God  he 
loves  are  still  his  own.  He  stands  like  a  rock  in  a 
stormy  sea,  and  cries  out,  "Though  He  slay  me, 
yet  will  I  trust  Him." 

But  what  of  the  man  who  has  no  faith,  who 
believes  in  no  protecting  providence,  who  sees  no 
father's  loving  face  above  the  ruin  of  his  earthly 
hopes?     There  is  for  him  no  cross  of  sacrifice,  no 


122     Connection  Between  Doctrine  and  Work 

promise  of  succor,  no  grand  spiritual  sphere 
unchanged,  and  unchangeable.  He  is  helpless 
and  drifting,  a  lost  mariner  in  the  darkness. 

There  are  great  and  divine  truths  that  fill  the 
moral  and  spiritual  sphere.  These  are  the  reali- 
ties which  endure.  Visible  things  float  on  the 
stream  of  time,  and  shall  at  last  be  engulfed  in 
the  eternal  sea.  The  permanent  things  are  in 
the  spiritual,  the  unseen.  God  is  the  sublimest 
fact ;  but  others  stand  related  to  that.  We  are 
His  creation.  By  sin  we  are  under  His  wrath, 
and  curse.  But  God  came  into  the  world,  assum- 
ing humanity  and  sin,  and  underwent  the  death 
of  the  cross,  that  we  might  be  saved  from  eternal 
death  by  faith  in  Him,  through  the  work  of  the 
Holy  Ghost.  There  is  a  hell;  there  is  a  heaven; 
death  shall  come  to  all,  but  there  shall  be  a  resur- 
rection ;  and  beyond  this  vale  of  tears  there  lies  a 
better  country,  where  there  shall  be  no  sorrow, 
no  sin,  no  death. 

Is  there  no  connection  between  human  life  and 
these  glorious  truths?  Are  they  set  beyond  an 
impassable  abyss,  where  no  poo*r  mortal  may 
derive  from  them  comfort  and  hope?  Is  there  no 
"therefore"  between  these  splendid  facts  and 
our  life?  Oh,  yes;  because  there  is  a  good  God, 
because  Christ  has  died  for  us,  because  we  are 
immortal  pilgrims  to  another  world,  "therefore," 
poor  mortal,  lift  up  your  head,  put  sin  beneath 
your  feet,  set  temptation  behind  you,  and  fix  your 
hopes  on  heaven;  "therefore,"  sad  mourner,  do 


Connection  Between  Doctrine  and  Work     123 

not  weep  as  those  who  have  no  hope ;  dry  up 
your  tears  and  see  a  city  in  the  sky ;  therefore, 
dying"  Christian,  be  of  good  cheer,  listen  for  the 
Master's  footsteps,  and  for  the  voices  that  call  to 
thee  from  the  great  beyond. 

The  apostle  in  the  fifteenth  chapter  of  1  Corin- 
thians has  traveled  with  the  thread  of  his  great  ar- 
gument for  immortality  and  resurrection  up  from 
the  shades  of  sorrow,  from  the  somber  chambers 
of  the  tomb.  He  has  defied  death  and  carried  the 
banner  of  his  victorious  march  into  the  very  por- 
tals of  the  grave ;  but  up  the  steps  of  light  he 
climbs,  the  glory  of  the  eternal  world  is  blazing 
around  him ;  his  path  is  all  aflame  with  radiancy 
divine.  But  having  reached  the  highest  height 
which  seems  to  touch  the  city  gates  of  heaven, 
with  beams  from  the  ineffable  majesty  flashing 
in  his  eyes,  does  he  forget  the  world  below  him? 
does  he  see  nothing  but  light?  Nay;  he  climbed 
to  heaven  to  bombard  the  world  with  glory.  With 
one  hand  pointing  upward,  the  other  extending 
downward,  he  swings  out  by  a  great  "THERE- 
FORE" the  exhortation,  "Be  ye  steadfast.' 
Look  yonder,  see  what  I  see,  and  "be  ye  stead- 
fast, unmovable,  always  abounding  in  the  work 
of  the  Lord,  forasmuch  as  ye  know  that  your 
labor  is  not  in  vain  in  the  Lord. " 

Stand  fast ;  endure  all  trial  and  sorrow ;  your 
hope  is  sure,  and  all  your  toil  is  not  in  vain  in  the 
Lord. 


WHAT  IS  WOMAN'S  WORK  IN  THE 
CHURCH  OF  GOD 

"and  next  to  him  repaired  shallum,  the  son 
of  halohesh,  the  ruler  of  the  half  part  of 
jerusalem,  he  and  his  daughters. neh.  3:12. 

Nehemiah  was  cup-bearer  to  Artaxerxes  Lon- 
ginas  (Artaxerxes,  the  Long-Handed),  king-  of 
Persia.  The  empire  was  then  in  the  zenith  of  its 
power.  It  was  about  446  B.  C.  Rome  was  yet 
but  adolescent,  and  Socrates,  Thucydides  and 
Xenophon  were  illustrious  contemporaries. 

Nehemiah,  a  Jew  of  princely  lineage,  occupying 
a  position  of  honor  and  luxury  in  the  court  of  the 
greatest  monarch  of  his  time,  was  not  forgetful 
of  the  people  of  God,  and  the  welfare  of  the  Holy 
City.  He  secures  permission  to  leave  the  cap- 
ital, to  undertake  a  journey  to  Jerusalem,  and  to 
rebuild  its  crumbling  walls.  We  have  a  brief 
but  graphic  account  of  his  long  journey  to  Jeru- 
salem, and  of  his  nocturnal  ride  around  the  walls, 
then  of  his  gathering  the  people  for  the  work. 
The  rebuilding  of  the  defenses  of  the  city  of  God 
may  be  taken  as  at  least  an  illustration  of  the 
upbuilding  of  the  kingdom  of  the  Lord,  and  so 
in  the  51st  Psalm  we  read  the  prayer  of  David, 
"Build  thou  the  walls  of  Jerusalem." 

124 


What  Is  Wo? nan's  Work  in  Church  of  God  125 

The  interesting  fact  to  which  we  call  special 
attention  just  now  is  that  in  the  illustrious  roster 
of  the  builders  of  the  walls  of  Jerusalem  under 
Nehemiah's  inspiration  wTe  find  the  name  of  Shal- 
lum,  and  the  statement  that  the  daughters  of 
Shallum  engaged  with  their  father  and  the  other 
men  in  the  glorious  toil.  Just  how  they  applied 
the  labor  of  their  loving  hands  we  are  not 
informed,  whether  they  actually  used  the  ham- 
mer and  trowel  in  this  holy  masonry  or  whether 
they  contributed  of  their  independent  means,  or 
whether  they  only  ministered  food,  drink,  cloth- 
ing and  shelter  to  the  men,  besides  giving  them 
the  courage  and  inspiration  of  their  devoted 
enthusiasm,  we  do  not  know,  but  we  are  assured 
that  they  were  useful  and  honored  helpers  in  the 
enterprise,  at  once  patriotic  and  religious,  of 
rebuilding  the  walls  of  Jerusalem. 

These  daughters  of  Shallum,  nameless  in 
earthly  memoirs,  though  not  nameless  in  the 
heavenly  annals  of  the  kingdom,  belong  to  that 
illustrious  company  of  godly  women  who  have 
been  helpers  in  the  church  of  God  in  all  the  ages. 

Of  a  goodly  number  of  women  workers,  the  names 
are  given  in  the  inspired  history  of  redemption. 

We  might  begin  with  Eve,  the  queen  mother 
of  the  human  race,  and  who,  while  doubt- 
less the  most  beautiful  and  gifted  of  women, 
showed,  by  her  momentous  error,  which  changed 
the  destiny  of  the  world,  how  great  may  be  a 
woman's  influence  for  weal  or  woe. 


126  What  Is  Woman's  Work  in  Church  of  God 

We  find  in  the  early  catalogue  of  the  great, 
along  with  the  names  of  Abraham,  Isaac  and 
Jacob,  those  of  Sarah  the  beautiful,  Rebecca 
the  devoted  mother,  and  Rachael  the  greatly 
mourned,  whose  tomb  still  calls  for  tears,  where 
it  stands  before  the  gates  of  Bethlehem.  Later 
we  behold  Miriam  guarding,  beside  the  river  of 
Egypt,  the  infant,  her  brother,  who  was  born  to 
deliver  Israel  and  to  lay  down  the  laws  for  God's 
people  of  all  subsequent  generations.  And  when 
Moses  and  the  enfranchised  nation  stand  upon 
the  banks  of  the  Red  Sea,  just  crossed  safely  by 
them,  but  now  the  watery  tomb  of  their  enemies, 
this  same  Miriam,  accompanied  by  the  women 
she  had  gathered,  leads  the  loud  peans  of  the 
triumphant  church. 

The  mother  of  Samuel  bringing  her  son  to  the 
Tabernacle  to  serve  the  Lord  is  another  scene  of 
rare  beauty;  and  Ruth,  the  Moabitess,  choosing 
Jehovah  as  her  God,  and  His  servants  as  her  peo- 
ple, destined  to  thus  become  an  ancestress  of  the 
Messiah,  is  one  of  the  women  whom  all  the 
nations  love. 

A  woman  of  Zarephath,  in  the  days  of  Elijah, 
is  honored  for  her  loving  care  of  the  persecuted 
prophet.  The  Shunammite  woman,  who  estab- 
lished a  prophet's  chamber  in  her  house  for 
Elisha,  and  whose  hospitality  God  so  greatly 
rewarded,  is  remembered  for  her  faith  that  shone 
like  a  star  in  darkest  night. 

We  might  speak  of  Abigail,  first  the  friend  and 


What  Is  Woman's  Work  in  Church  of  God  127 

then  the  wife  of  David ;  Esther,  the  patriot  and 
woman  of  God,  and  in  the  New  Testament,  of 
Elizabeth,  the  mother  of  John  the  Baptist,  Martha 
and  Mary  of  Bethany,  Dorcas  the  charitable, 
Lydia  the  first  convert  in  Europe,  Phoebe  the 
deaconess  of  Cenchrea,  Priscilla  the  courageous, 
Tryphena,  Tryphosa,  Persis,  and  many  others, 
like  the  Canaanitish  woman  whose  daughter  Christ 
healed,  the  widow  who  gave  her  mite,  the  woman 
who  bathed  the  Master's  feet  with  her  tears, 
unnamed  in  holy  writ.  But  time  fails  us  except  to 
tell  of  the  two  greatest,  Mary  Magdalene  and 
Mary  the  mother  of  Jesus,  the  former  distin- 
guised  for  the  love  that  made  her  earliest  at  the 
sepulcher  to  meet  the  risen  Lord,  and  the  latter 
as  she  who  suggested  Christ's  first  miracle,  never 
doubted  his  Sonship  to  God,  and  whose  mournful 
figure  at  the  cross  beside  her  dying  Son  has  ex- 
cited the  respect  and  affectionate  admiration  of 
all  Christians. 

Thus  we  see  how  important  were  women  in  the 
church  of  Bible  times,  and  can  feel  what  a  loss 
the  world  would  sustain  if  their  names  and 
labors  were  stricken  out  of  the  history  and 
achievements  of  the  kingdom.  Their  names 
shine  with  holy  lustre,  and  their  faith,  love  and 
service  constitute  an  imperishable  inheritance  for 
their  daughters  now  living  not  only,  but  also  for 
their  sons  and  all  mankind.  They  have  been 
noble  helpers  in  all  ages  in  building  up  the 
church  of  God, 


128   What  Is  Woman's  Work  in  Church  of  God 

The  church  since  the  close  of  the  sacred  canon 
has  not  been  without  daughters  who  have  been 
famous  among  the  great,  and  outside  the  church 
find  among  illustrious  women  patriots,  poets,  his- 
torians, novelists,  artists,  sovereigns,  and  all  the 
world  knows  that  the  most  illustrious  monarch  of 
of  the  last  century,  was  her  majesty  Victoria,  the 
Queen  Empress  of  Great  Britain,  who  as  a  wife, 
mother,  friend  and  ruler  for  sixty-three  years 
illustrated  all  that  is  truest,  most  beautiful  and 
best  in  human  character. 

We  have  thus  briefly  named  a  few  of  the 
women  who  have  blessed  mankind.  The  unwrit- 
ten millions  God  alone  and  their  loved  ones  knew 
and  know.  Beyond  all  doubt  the  majority  of  the 
saved  are  women.  The  majority  of  the  world's 
and  the  church's  heroisms  are  from  women. 
Here  and  there  we  find  a  hero  among  men,  but 
every  true  mother  is  a  heroine.  So  also  is  many 
a  woman  not  a  mother,  nor  a  wife,  whose  cour- 
age, faith,  patience,  steadfastness,  virtue,  love 
and  self-sacrifice  have  given  lines  of  light,  truth 
and  hope  in  the  histories  of  unnumbered  circles 
of  mankind.  Woman  is  greatest  in  her  unselfish 
devotion  to  others.  It  is  seen  in  all  her  life  from 
where  she  rocks  the  cradle  to  where  she  weeps 
over  a  grave,  and  in  the  innumerable  offices  of 
devotion  she  performs  for  others,  loved  herself  or 
unloved,  in  this  sinning,  suffering  world. 

This  being  her  character  and  disposition,  it  is 
no  wonder  that  her  heart  goes  out  in  prayer  and 


What  Is  Woman's  Work  in  Church  of  God  129 

toil  for  all  heathen,  the  people  that  know  not 
God,  and  that  she  is  prominent  in  all  missionary- 
undertakings. 

Though  it  cannot  be  denied  that  some  women 
have  been  greatly  useful  in  public  positions,  yet 
it  is  certain  woman's  greatest  sphere  is  not 
on  the  rostrum,  the  hustings,  or  the  battlefield. 
Woman  is  strongest  in  the  sphere  where 
God  placed  her.  Her  sphere  is  in  private,  and 
for  her  toil  she  will  usually  have  credit  only 
with  God,  and  in  the  circle  where  she  moves. 
She  is  not  a  leader  but  a  helper.  The  women 
working  on  the  walls  of  Jerusalem  were  the  help- 
ers of  their  father  and  the  other  builders.  They 
are  not  named  save  as  Shallum's  daughters,  and 
the  right-minded  woman  is  best  pleased  to  have 
her  father,  husband,  or  brother  honored.  Her  work 
oftener  makes  others  famous  than  herself,  and 
in  this  her  office  illustrates  the  highest  virtue 
mankind  knows — self-sacrifice  for  others,  which 
was  transfigured  in  the  life  and  death  of  Christ. 
Be  it  remembered  also  that  the  one  human  link 
with  the  race  He  died  to  save  was  through  a 
woman,  his  mother,  Mary  the  Blessed. 

How  does  woman  help  the  world? 

By  preparing  the  workers. 

The  first  school  is  at  a  mother's  knee,  where 
we  are  taught  truth  and  duty,  and  where  we  learn 
to  pray.  There  is  beauty,  indeed  sublimity,  in 
the  thought  of  the  millions  of  mothers  now 
engaged  in   the    instruction    of   the   generation 


130   What  Is  Woman's  Work  in  Church  of  God 

about  to  step  out  on  the  stage  of  life,  and  in  their 
faithful  performance  of  this  glorious  task  lies, 
next  to  the  Gospel  itself,  the  greatest  hope  of  the 
future.  The  coming  century  is  going  to  be 
largely  what  the  mothers  make  it.  Some  of  us 
whose  mothers  have  been  laid  beneath  the  sod 
cherish  their  names  and  lives  as  the  holiest  of  all 
memories,  after  the  biography  of  Christ.  Our 
debt  to  them  we  can  never  pay.  The  morals  of 
a  man  are  generally  what  a  woman,  or  women, 
make  them,  and  a  man's  morals  determine  his 
true  place  in  the  church  and  the  world. 

Then  who  can  measure  the  power  of  woman's 
inspiration  of  men.  The  greatest  number 
of  the  world's  and  the  church's  heroes  would 
never  have  been  heard  of  but  for  the  inspiration 
of  some  woman  or  women.  Men  that  have  been 
truly  great  she  has  helped  to  greatness.  These 
things  are  not  always  matters  of  history ;  oftener 
only  God  and  the  angels  know. 

The  help  of  women  in  foreign  missions  is 
beyond  calculation.  St.  Paul  wrote  from  Rome 
to  his  "true  yokefellow,"  probably  pastor,  at 
Philippi,  "Help  those  women  that  labored  with 
me  in  the  Gospel."  Help  those  that  helped 
and  are  helping.  The  woman's  foreign  mis- 
sionary societies  of  the  church  have  done  a  glo- 
rious work.  Their  gifts  count  by  the  thousands 
and  thousands  of  dollars,  and  their  inspiration, 
example  and  prayers  are  worth  millions.  Every 
pastor  knows  how  difficult  it  is  to  keep  any  society 


What  Is  Woman's  Work  in  Church  of  God  131 

of  men  organized,  but  the  women  organize  them- 
selves, and  persevere,  encouraged  or  unencour- 
aged,  with  a  devotion  that  is  inextinguishable. 
In  a  church  of  which  I  was  once  pastor  a  young 
lady  on  the  occasion  of  her  marriage  was  asked 
by  the  happy  bridegroom  what  she  would  prefer 
for  a  bridal  present,  said,  "Give  me  a  mission- 
ary, ' '  and  this  her  husband  did,  sending  out  to 
China  one  whom  he  will  support  as  long  as  she 
lives,  to  labor  in  that  great  empire. 

Of  their  labors  as  missionaries  in  the  foreign 
field  what  can  we  say?  Oh,  if  we  began,  where 
could  we  ever  stop?  Their  love  and  gentleness 
is  the  first  thing  that  wins  the  hearts  of  the 
heathen.  In  the  mission  school,  in  the  homes  of 
the  people,  the  harem,  the  Zenanna,  what  could 
men  do?  In  many  countries  men  are  absolutely 
shut  out  from  the  homes  of  the  native  people,  but 
woman  is  admitted,  and  carries  light,  and  peace, 
and  joy  to  many  a  crushed  and  hopeless  heart. 
Many  of  our  godly  women  have  gone  far  away  to 
this  work.  To  compare  our  small  sacrifices  with 
theirs  makes  us  ashamed,  and  we  can  only  fall  on 
our  knees  to  beg  God's  richest  benediction  upon 
them,  where,  with  continents  or  wide  oceans 
between  themselves  and  home,  they  toil  for  the 
souls  of  men.  God  bless  our  women.  May 
their  hearts  never  be  discouraged,  nor  their 
hands  falter,  as  they  labor  to  build  up  the  walls 
of  the  Jerusalem  that  is  the  mother  of  us  all,  the 
city  of  God  that  shall  stand  resplendent  in  eter- 


132   What  Is  Woman's  Work  in  Church  of  God 

nity  when  moons,  planets,  and  suns  have  ceased 
to  shine.  They  have  led  and  do  lead  the  praises 
of  the  church  on  earth;  we  do  not  know  how 
great  their  part  shall  be  in  the  church  of  heaven. 
Meanwhile,  they  do  ever  toil,  and  sing,  and  pray. 


HOW  CAN   MAN   KNOW  THAT  HE 
SHALL  RISE  FROM  THE  GRAVE 

"HE    IS    RISEN    AS    HE    SAID." ST.    MATT.    28:    6. 

In  the  matchless  fifteenth  chapter  of  i  Corin- 
thians, where  the  inspired  author,  rising  to  the 
highest  eloquence,  seems  to  speak  with  the 
tongues  both  of  men  and  angels,  the  Apostle 
Paul  conditions  the  credibility  of  the  whole  Chris- 
tian religion  upon  the  single  fact  of  the  resurrec- 
tion of  Christ,  he  declares:  "And  if  Christ  be  not 
risen,  then  is  our  preaching  vain,  and  your  faith 
is  also  vain."  When  he  appeared  before  the 
council  in  Jerusalem  he  said  also:  "Of  the  hope 
and  resurrection  of  the  dead  I  am  called  in  ques- 
tion." This  he  repeated  to  Felix;  and  when  he 
appeared  before  Agrippa,  he  asked,  at  the  outset 
of  his  defense,  "Why  should  it  be  thought  a  thing 
incredible  with  you  that  God  should  raise  the 
dead?"  He  was  prepared  to  prove  that  Christ 
was  risen,  his  main  argument  being  that  he  him- 
self had  seen  Him,  as  had  also  all  of  the  other 
apostles,  which  fact  they,  as  apostles,  were 
mainly  set  to  bear  witness  to,  that  at  the  begin- 
ning of  the  career  of  the  Gospel  throughout  the 
world  this  foundation  truth  might  be  thoroughly 
established  in  the  belief  of  men.     And  we  may 

133 


134  How  Can  Man  Know  that  He 

say,  without  pausing  to  argue  the  statement  that 
no  fact  in  the  history  of  the  world  is  better  proven 
than  that  Jesus  of  Nazareth  is  risen,  and  that 
those  who  believe  in  Him  are  trusting  not  a  dead 
Saviour  but  a  living  Lord. 

The  first  intention  of  the  resurrection  of 
Christ  was  to  prove  His  divinity.  It  does  prove 
it,  but  not  as  it  stands  alone,  if  it  be  dissociated 
from  His  own  words.  The  power  to  perform 
miracles  does  not  prove  any  man  to  be  divine. 
Moses,  Elisha,  the  Apostles,  and  others,  per- 
formed miracles  on  the  sick,  the  blind,  and  even 
the  dead.  True,  no  one  of  them  was  permitted 
to  perform  the  highest  miracle  of  himself  dying 
and  rising  from  the  tomb.  This  stupendous 
power  over  nature  was  allowed  to  none  but  the 
Son  of  God,  but  there  is  nothing  intrinsically 
impossible  in  God's  giving  any  man  even  that 
sublime  privilege.  He  reserved  this,  however, 
for  His  Only-Begotten  Son. 

A  miracle  only  proves  that  the  man  who  per- 
forms it  is  divinely  commissioned,  and  that  what 
he  says  is  to  be  believed  as  true.  Miracles  are 
the  divine  credentials  vouchsafed  in  many  cases 
to  those  who  have  spoken  from  God  to  man.  This 
was  their  use  to  such  Old  Testament  worthies  as 
God  allowed  to  perform  wonders  above  the  ordi- 
nary method  of  nature,  and  the  same  applies  to 
the  miracle  workers  in  the  New  Dispensation. 
But  not  one  of  them  ever  claimed  divinity  except 
Christ.     If  miracles  did  not,  in  themselves,  prove 


Shall  Rise  from  the  Grave  135 

His  Sonship  to  God;  they  authenticated  His 
infallible  truthfulness,  when  He  said:  "I  and  my 
Father  are  one";  "He  that  hath  seen  me,  hath 
seen  the  Father";  and  when  He  spoke  to  His 
Father  of  the  glory  He  had  with  Him  before  the 
world  was. 

Now,  as  the  greatest  claim  ever  made  by  any 
person  was  that  He  was  God  incarnate,  and  as 
such  an  assumption  required  an  extraordinary 
attestation,  Christ  performed  the  mightiest  of 
all  miracles.  He  threw  down  the  gauntlet  to 
Judea  and  Rome.  "Destroy  this  temple  (or 
body),  and  in  three  days  I  will  raise  it  up. "  They 
took  up  the  great  challenge,  and  killed  Him  by 
the  method  of  the  cross,  in  presence  of  assembled 
thousands.  He  was  buried,  and  a  Roman  guard 
watched  the  sealed  tomb,  lest  His  disciples  might 
steal  Him  away,  and  fraudulently  lay  claim  to 
His  resurrection.  How  calm  was  His  rising! 
True,  earth  shook,  as  well  it  might,  when 
the  Lord  who  made  it  rose  from  the  dead,  and 
the  Roman  guards  fell  stunned  to  the  ground, 
but  in  the  pale  light  of  dawn  angels  rolled  the 
stone  away,  and  ministering  in  the  bed-chamber 
of  the  King,  removed  the  linen  cloth  and  the 
napkin  that  was  about  His  head,  and  in  grand 
order  folded  these  cerements  of  the  grave, 
while  the  triumphant  Saviour  stepped  upon  the 
horizon  of  a  redeemed  world.  No  shout  of 
triumph  was  heard  as  of  one  who  had  come 
through  anxious  labor  and  uncertain  hope  to  a 


136  How  Can  Man  Know  that  He 

great  achievement  and  victory,  but  it  was  with 
the  calm  dignity  of  omnipotence  that  knew  no 
doubt  nor  fear. 

How  significant  His  first  words:  "Woman,  why 
weepest  thou?"  and  His  first  revelation  to  mortals 
of  His  triumph  over  sin  and  death  was  in  the  ask- 
ing of  this  question,  and  the  utterance  of  a 
woman '  s  name, '  'Jesus  saith  unto  her,  Mary ! ' '  Here 
was  one  who  could  ask  every  mourner,  whatever 
might  be  his  grief,  "Why  weepest  thou?"  and 
who  was  able  to  bestow  sovereign  balm  upon  all 
wounded  hearts,  as  well  as  to  "wipe  away  all 
tears  from  all  eyes. "  The  angels  had  sung  over 
His  cradle,  and  now,  guarding  and  ministering 
at  His  tomb,  they  announced  His  resurrection  to 
the  saddened  and  incredulous  woman.  She 
heeds  not  the  angels'  declaration,  "He  is  risen  as 
He  said,"  but  when  Christ  speaks  her  name  she 
knows  her  Lord,  and  bows  in  worship  at  His  feet. 

"He  is  risen  as  He  said"  means,  the  resurrec- 
tion is  the  keeping  of  His  word;  it  testifies  that 
all  He  said  to  men  was  true,  and  that  He  is 
divine  and  able  to  save  to  the  uttermost  all  that 
put  their  trust  in  Him.  Death,  the  grave  and 
eternity  opened  their  lips  as  they  had  never 
done  before  to  say  this  is  the  Son  of  God.  The 
utterance  that  comes  from  the  marble  lips  of  the 
tomb  is  the  Eternal  Word — the  incarnate  God. 

The  resurrection  of  Christ  is  also  proof  of 
our  own  resurrection.  In  a  realm  so  far  removed 
from  ordinary  experience,  we  require  something 


Shall  Rise  from  the  Grave  137 

more  than  arguments  to  prove  that  "if  a  man 
die  he  shall  live  again. ' '  A  fact  is  better  than 
an  argument.  Let  us  see  one  raised  who  was 
dead ;  yea,  one  who  can  rise  in  his  own  might. 
Here  we  have  a  dead  man  raised  to  life  again — 
"the  first  fruits  of  them  that  slept."  Others  had 
been  raised  by  divinely  commissioned  men,  but 
this  is  one  who  had  none  to  stand  over  his  grave 
and  speak  words  of  divine  command. 

The  resurrection  of  Christ  taken  alone  does  not 
prove  that  we  shall  rise  again.  It  proves  that  it 
is  a  practicable  thing,  and  possible.  It  shows 
that  death  can  be  overcome,  and  that  Christ  can 
do  it,  that  He  can  raise  us  all  from  the  dust.  But 
it  does  not  prove  that  He  will.  How  do  I  know 
that  He  will  give  me  this  glorious  boon?  that  the 
almighty  Son  of  God  will  care  enough  for  this 
mortal  frame  to  give  it  immortality?  We  know 
it  for  one,  and  only  one,  reason — He  said  He 
would.  He  said  he  would  raise  Himself,  and  He 
did  it.  He  also  said,  "All  that  are  in  their 
graves  shall  hear  the  voice  of  the  Son  of  Man, 
and  shall  come  forth. ' '  Our  sure  hope  of  resur- 
rection is  Christ's  promise,  and  the  certainty  that 
He  is  willing  to  keep  it  because  He  died  for  us,  and  is 
able  to  keep  it,  because  He  raised  Himself. 

We  are  all  familiar  with  the  ordinary  argu- 
ments for  the  resurrection  drawn  from  the 
analogies  of  nature.  The  crysalis  sleeps  in  its  gray 
shell,  under  the  similitude  of  death.  The  sacred 
beetle  of  Egypt  lies  dormant  in  the  banks  of  the 


138  How  Can  Man  Know  that  He 

Nile  until  the  hour  of  renewed  activity.  The 
ancient  Egyptians  made  silver  and  golden  images 
of  them  to  bury  in  the  mummied  bodies  of  their 
dead.  It  is  true  the  crysalis  does  burst  its  shell 
in  the  spring,  and  spread  new  wings  to  fly,  and  also 
that  in  many  of  the  marvelous  phenomena  of 
nature  similar  sequences  of  apparent  death  fol- 
lowed by  renewed  life,  are  observed.  But  they 
fail  to  prove  anything  certainly.  These  things 
were  not  dead;  they  only  slept.  Crush  the  sacred 
beetle  under  your  foot;  pierce  with  a  needle  the 
crysalis;  destroy  its  life,  or  the  life  of  anything, 
and  see  whether  it  will  revive  again.  Nay,  out- 
side the  pages  of  the  inspired  Word,  we  know 
nothing  surely  of  life  beyond  death.  Man  with- 
out revelation  may  dream  of  immortality,  but  it 
is  only  a  dream,  and  the  wish  is  father  to  the 
thought.  No  Christian,  in  a  time  of  bereave- 
ment, as  he  stands  beside  the  new  grave  of  a 
dear  one,  thinks  of  seeking  comfort  from  the 
analogies  of  nature.  His  one  consolation  is 
Christ's  resurrection  and  His  promise  to  raise  all 
men  from  the  dead.  "He  is  risen  as  He  said" 
is  the  electric  flash  that  throws  its  revealing 
beam  into  the  darkness  of  the  unseen  world,  and 
shows  us  the  other  shore.  Yea,  death  has 
acquired  a  sweet  friendliness  since  Christ  has 
died,  and  the  tomb  itself  is  now  to  all  believers 
but  the  bed-chamber  where  our  flesh  shall  rest 
in  hope,  where  we  await  the  fulfillment  of 
Christ's  promise,  "I  will  come  again  and  take 


Shall  Rise  from  the  Grave  139 

you  unto  myself,  that  where  I  am  ye  may  be 
also. ' ' 

The  resurrection  also  has  a  moral  and  spirit- 
ual significance.  Christ's  resurrection  typifies 
the  raising  of  the  soul  from  the  death  of  sin  into 
newness  of  life  and  the  perfect  restoration  of  all 
its  powers. 

We  have  recorded  in  the  Scriptures  only  three 
miracles  of  resurrection  performed  by  Christ  on 
the  bodies  of  men.     There  was  no  need  of  more. 

The  raising  of  Jairus'  daughter  was  the  resto- 
ration of  one  who  had  just  died.  The  process  of 
decay  had  made  no  noticeable  progress,  and  as 
she  lay  motionless  on  the  couch,  where  tender 
hands  had  placed  her,  she  lacked  little  of  the 
beauty  of  life.  But  she  was  dead.  The  tene- 
ment was  as  completely  vacant  and  deserted  as  if 
it  had  already  crumbled  to  dust.  She  typifies  the 
characters  we  know  so  well  who  have  every  trait  of 
moral  loveliness  except  the  new  life  from  above. 

The  widow's  son,  of  Nain,  was  a  case  in  which 
death  had  gone  further.  The  young  man  had 
died,  and  now,  wrapped  in  his  winding  sheet, 
was  being  borne  to  his  grave.  How  often  do  we 
see  this  mournful  scene  enacting  in  the  moral 
world,  when  some  young  man  is  being  carried  by 
his  boon  companions  to  a  wretched  end.  Oh, 
beware,  young  man,  young  woman,  you  who  are 
being  borne  along  the  way  of  vice !  That  path 
you  are  treading  ends  in  a  grave  of  pollution, 
despair  and  death. 


140   How  Can  Man  Know  that  He  Shall  Rise 

Lazarus  of  Bethany  represents  the  man  who 
has  run  the  course  of  sin,  and  who  lies  decaying 
in  the  lowest  depths  of  moral  corruption.  "By 
this  time  he  stinketh,"  and  his  best  friends  cannot 
bear  to  have  him  in  their  sight. 

But  all  three  were  equally  dead.  None  except 
a  divine  voice  could  speak  the  word  that  would 
raise  them,  and  one  resurrection  was  as  easy  to 
Him  as  another. 

Now,  Christ  died  for  our  sins,  as  our  represen- 
tative, and  His  death  is  ours.     We  died  in  Him. 

So  His  resurrection  is  ours,  and  becomes  the 
pledge  and  prophecy  of  the  complete  resurrec- 
tion of  our  moral  natures,  formed  anew  in  the 
image  of  God. 

In  that  famous  passage  which  has  been  read 
at  so  many  thousands  of  funerals,  "NOW  is 
Christ  risen  from  the  dead,"  there  seems  to  be 
an  implied  antithesis  between  the  present  and 
the  future.  "Now"  and" then.'"  Now  Heisrisen, 
and  we  have  thus  the  pledge  that  in  God's  time 
we  shall  rise.  How  glorious  such  thoughts  as 
these  in  the  sad  presence  of  our  beloved  dead,  and 
when  our  own  departure  draws  nigh !  What 
rapture  and  hope  to  remember  that  "He,"  in 
whom  we  trust,  "is  risen  as  He  said." 


HOW   IS   THE   WORLD   TO   KNOW 
THAT  JESUS  CHRIST  IS  ALIVE 

"and  ye  shall  be  witnesses  unto  me  both  in 
jerusalem,  and  in  all  judea,  and  in  samaria, 
and  unto  the  uttermost  part  of  the  earth." 

ACTS  I:  8. 

These  were,  according  to  the  book  of  Acts,  the 
last  words  of  Jesus  Christ  of  Nazareth,  and  in 
them  He  commits  His  reputation  and  His  king- 
dom to  His  disciples.  Thereafter  the  world  was 
to  know  Christ  through  Christians.  What  are 
men  called  upon  to  accept  as  the  testimony  of 
Christ's  followers? 

They  are  called  upon  to  believe  that  a  man, 
said  to  be  divine,  whom  no  person  living  has  ever 
seen,  is  yet  present  though  invisible,  and  the 
Supreme  Ruler  of  all  things  and  all  people.  He 
is  a  King  who  has  no  munitions  of  war,  no  capi- 
tal nor  palace  on  earth,  and  whose  empire  is 
propagated  by  ideas  alone. 

Moreover,  this  King  was  ignominiously  cruci- 
fied by  the  Romans,  at  the  instigation  of  His  own 
race,  two  thousand  years  ago.  And  the  testi- 
mony to  prove  that  He  rose  from  the  dead  is 
from  His  disciples,  who  were  long  treated  as 
fanatics  and  persecuted,  many  of  them  to  death, 

141 


142  How  Is  the  World  to  Know  that 

by  the  people  of  their  day.  Not  one  word  of  dis- 
interested secular  history  can  be  quoted  to  prove 
that  any  one  ever  saw  Jesus  after  He  was  laid  in 
the  tomb.  True,  His  body  could  not  be  found 
after  the  third  day,  but  the  authorities  declared 
that  His  disciples  stole  it  while  the  Romans  on 
guard  slept  at  their  post. 

Now  men  are  called  upon  to  believe  the  story 
of  His  resurrection  and  to  accept  this  crucified 
man  as  the  Supreme  Ruler  of  their  lives ;  yea,  to 
commit  all  their  earthly  possessions  to  Him;  to 
die  for  Him  if  need  be,  and  entrust  to  His  care 
their  eternal  well-being.  In  other  words,  they 
are  expected  to  risk  their  mortal  and  immortal 
happiness  upon  the  alleged  fact  that  Tesus  Christ 
is  alive,  and  that  He  is  God. 

Surely  men  have  a  right  to  ask  very  strong 
proof  of  a  fact  upon  which  they  are  called  upon 
to  risk  so  much.  What  is  the  proof?  How  are 
men  to  know  that  Jesus  is  alive,  and  that  He  is 
the  Son  of  God? 

The  Scriptures  are  written  to  prove  it. 

The  Scriptures  are  to  show  the  whole  story  of 
prophecy  concerning  Christ,  and  its  actual  ful- 
fillment in  His  person,  His  life,  words,  works, 
death,  and  resurrection. 

It  must  be  said  that  the  Scripture  story  holds 
together  well,  and  shows  a  wonderful  harmony  in 
all  its  parts.  The  story,  begun  by  Moses,  moves 
smoothly  on,  stage  by  stage,  until  it  is  finished 
by  St.  John. 


Jesus  Christ  Is  Alive  143 

It  contains  no  contradictory  statements,  though 
written  by  a  variety  of  men  of  different  ages, 
thousands  of  years  apart.  It  is  a  marvelous  book. 
There  is  no  other  book  that  contains  such  philos- 
ophy, such  poetry,  such  theology,  such  morals. 
We  may  concede  it  to  be  the  most  wonderful 
book  ever  written,  and  to  excel  all  others  as  the 
sun  outshines  the  stars.  In  the  Scripture  narra- 
tive we  have  a  number  of  men  declaring  that 
they  saw  Jesus  alive  after  His  entombment.  This 
too  they  protested  at  the  risk,  and  many  of  them 
at  the  expense,  of  their  lives. 

But  is  this  evidence  sufficient  to  persuade  men 
to  believe  in  the  resurrection  of  Christ,  a  thing 
utterly  contrary  to  all  precedent  and  experience? 
Whatever  may  be  said  as  to  how  men  ought  to 
believe  on  these  evidences,  the  fact  is  they  do 
not,  and  will  not,  on  these  evidences  alone. 
There  must  be  something  more.  There 
must  be  a  supernatural  proof  of  an  alleged 
supernatural  fact,  and  it  must  be  present,  con- 
temporary, supernatural  proof.  There  must  be 
supernatural  effects  now  to  prove  an  alleged  su- 
pernatural fact.  The  world  will  never  be  satisfied 
with  the  testimony  of  men  who  lived  two  thou- 
sand years  ago.  The  world  demands  present, 
supernatural  evidences  to  prove  that  Jesus  Christ 
is  alive,  that  He  is  divine,  and  that  He  rules  to- 
day— all-powerful  in  heaven  and  in  earth. 
Before  He  died  He  is  alleged  to  have  proved 
that  He  would  rise,  by  raising  others  from  the 


144  How  Is  the  World  to  Know  that 

dead.  We  must  have  the  same  kind  of  proof 
now.  Men  are  said  to  have  believed  then  that 
He  would  rise  from  the  dead,  because  He  raised 
others.  He  must  do  that  now,  if  the  world  is  to 
believe  that  He  has  raised  Himself.  Have  we 
any  such  proof?  I  affirm  that  we  have,  that 
every  age  has  had  that  kind  of  proof,  and  that 
there  have  been  and  are  resurrections  from  the 
dead  continually  occurring  before  the  eyes  of 
men. 

When  Christ  said,  "and  ye  shall  be  witnesses 
unto  me,"  He  was  speaking  to  men  who  had  been 
dead  but  whom  He  had  raised  from  the  dead. 
We  speak  of  a  moral  and  spiritual  resurrection ; 
not  a  physical,  and  do  aver  that  it  is  a  greater 
thing  to  raise  a  soul,  a  life,  from  the  death  of  sin 
than  to  raise  a  body  from  the  tomb.  In  this  mat- 
ter Christ  declared  of  His  miracles,  "and  greater 
things  than  these  shall  ye  do,  because  I  go  unto 
my  Father."  In  other  words,  "I  will  do  greater 
things  through  you,  after  my  ascension,  than  I 
did  while  visibly  present  on  earth."  Greater 
proof  would  be  given,  because  greater  proof 
would  be  needed.  It  is  harder  to  persuade  the 
world  to  believe  in  a  person  unseen,  who  died, 
than  in  a  person  seen  who  merely  says  he  is  going 
to  die  and  rise  from  the  dead.  Let  us  see  what 
is  the  proof. 

The  resurrection  of  races  and  nations  from  sin, 
degradation  and  ignorance,  proves  that  Jesus 
Christ  is  alive,  and  that  He  is  the  Son  of  God. 


Jesus  Christ  Is  Alive  145 

No  one  can  believe  that  the  human  and  theolog- 
ical means  appointed  were  sufficient  to  account 
for  the  conversion  of  the  Roman  Empire  in  three 
hundred  years.  The  empire  crucified  Christ  as 
a  malefactor,  and  after  three  hundred  years 
acknowledged  Him  as  God.  A  band  of  Galilean 
peasants  and  one  converted  Pharisee  could  not 
have  accomplished  this  result.  The  religions  of 
Greece  and  Rome  were  entrenched  in  the  tradi- 
tions, the  literature,  and  the  sacred  associations 
of  hundreds  of  years.  They  were  defended  by 
the  philosophers,  statesmen,  poets,  armies,  and 
emperors  of  the  worldwide  empire.  And  yet, 
after  three  hundred  years,  the  Emperor  Constan- 
tine  made  Christianity  the  established  religion  of 
the  world,  and  stamping  the  name  of  Jesus  upon 
the  coins  of  the  realm,  made  the  cross  to  stand 
above  the  Roman  eagle  as  the  highest  symbol  of 
power. 

Now  it  is  absurd  to  say  that  the  plain  people 
called  Christians  did  this.  They  were  the  jest  of 
Rome,  and  were  put  to  death  by  thousands  to 
amuse  the  populace.  The  only  rational  explana- 
tion of  this  miracle  of  history  is  that  what  Christ 
is  alleged  to  have  said  after  His  alleged  resurrec- 
tion was  true,  that  He  was  risen  from  the  dead, 
and  had  committed  to  Him  "all  power  in  heaven 
and  in  earth."  Here  was  a  miracle  of  resurrec- 
tion indeed ;  the  resurrection  of  an  empire  from  the 
death-sleep  of  ages,  and  so  Christian  Rome  proved 
that  Jesus  Christ  was  alive  and  the  living  God. 


146  How  Is  the  World  to  Know  that 

The  same  thing  has  happened  over  and  over 
again  from  age  to  age.  The  conversion  of  every 
nation  that  has  been  converted  is  a  repetition  of 
the  same  miracle.  I  do  not  mean  the  mere  change 
of  opinion  or  change  of  religion,  but  the  changed 
life  of  men ;  their  uplift  into  a  new  plane  of  being 
with  virtue,  holiness,  charity,  and  all  their  powers 
renewed  for  achievement  in  every  department  of 
life.  What  is  called  Christian  civilization  is  the 
result  of  a  miracle  of  resurrection. 

What  were  our  forefathers  before  the  Gospel 
came  to  them?  Naked  savages  practicing  every 
crime  and  degraded  to  the  level  of  brutes.  What 
are  we  now?  The  difference  is  a  miracle.  Every 
Christian  state,  every  great  achievement  of  civ- 
ilization, the  railway,  telegraph,  telephone,  are 
proofs  that  Jesus  Christ  is  risen  from  the  dead. 

We  might  go  further  and  point  to  thousands  of 
orphan  asylums,  homes  for  the  blind,  deaf  and 
dumb,  insane,  and  the  poor,  and  to  millions  of 
homes  of  purity  and  love ;  but  we  must  pass  on. 

The  individual  Christian  is  the  only  argument, 
taken  in  connection  with  the  Bible  statements,  that 
will  satisfy  men. 

It  may  be  said  that  the  great  things  just 
referred  to  are  the  natural  result  of  the  growth  of 
mankind  as  a  race  from  a  condition  of  infancy  to 
adult  life.  We  might  answer,  No,  there  is  no 
such  growth,  and  nations  that  have  given  up 
Christianity  have  always  relapsed  into  barbar- 
ism, but  these  arguments  will  not  satisfy  man- 


Jesus  Christ  Is  Alive  147 

kind.  What  the  world  demands  is  a  miracle  on 
an  individual  man ;  they  must  see  a  man  who  has 
been  raised  from  the  dead;  a  man  whose  life 
shows  a  supernatural  power,  which  is  a  super- 
natural result. 

Well  the  world  has  always,  since  Jesus  died, 
had  these  proofs.  It  was  so  in  the  days  of  Paul, 
Peter,  Stephen,  John.  It  was  so  in  the  days  of 
Savonarola,  John  Huss,  Wickliffe,  and  so  on,  and 
it  is  so  to-day.  Men  have  seen  men  whose  lives 
bore  the  marks  of  miracle. 

Bishop  Ridley  preached  in  British  Columbia  to 
the  savage  Indians.  No  impression  was  made 
until  the  Indians  saw  something  in  him  that  was 
divine,  and  of  the  other  world,  something  above 
man,  a  love  and  patience  superhuman.  Then  a 
few,  the  few  who  knew  him  well,  believed.  They 
built  a  little  church.  The  unbelieving  Indians 
burned  it  down.  Ridley  and  his  converts  knelt 
and  prayed  for  their  persecutors.  Their  perse- 
cutors believed,  and  became  Christians  because 
they  saw  what  they  recognized  as  a  miracle. 
Here  was  something  so  far  above  man  that  they 
at  once  ascribed  it  to  the  Jesus  divine  whom  the 
missionaries  preached. 

We  do  not  need  to  look  for  cases  like  this. 
They  can  be  found  in  the  whole  history  of  mis- 
sions, home  and  foreign,  and  all  mission  fields 
to-day  blossom  with  these  miracles  of  the  divine 
Christ  in  man. 

There  are  unconverted  people  all  around  us; 


148      How  Know  that  Jesus  Christ  Is  Alive 

what  proof  have  they  that  Jesus  Christ  is  the  Son 
of  God  and  alive?  The  Bible  says  He  is,  but  they 
ask,  "Is  the  Bible  true?"  The  answer  is  the 
lives  of  Christians.  Just  in  proportion  as  we 
show  ourselves  like  Christ,  show  ourselves  of 
heaven  more  than  earth,  just  so  much  will  men 
believe  in  our  crucified  Redeemer. 

Thank  God,  we  have  miracles  of  grace  among 
us.  We  all  have  loved  ones,  or  friends,  who  show 
by  their  lives  a  power  that  can  come  from 
nowhere  but  Christ. 

A  prisoner  in  a  deep,  dark  cell,  with  a  window 
high  above  his  head  knows  the  sun  is  risen, 
because,  though  he  cannot  see  it,  he  beholds  the 
light  within  his  dungeon  walls.  So  we  know 
that  Christ  is  risen  because  His  celestial  light  is 
shining  all  around  us. 

The  tomb  of  sin  is  made  resplendent  with  light 
immortal,  as  each  soul  is  renewed,  in  the  image  of 
God  and  raised  from  the  dead,  and  stands  among 
men  as  much  a  miracle  as  when  Lazarus,  in 
response  to  a  divine  call,  stepped  from  the  rock- 
sealed  sepulchre. 

A  moral  miracle  is  more  potent  than  a  physical 
miracle.  The  raising  of  Lazarus  converted  none ; 
but  the  death  of  Stephen  made  men  believe.  It 
was  something  for  a  dead  man  to  be  raised  by 
Christ,  but  it  was  a  greater  thing  for  a  living 
man  to  die  for  Christ.  It  is  also  just  as  great  for 
one  to  live  for  Christ  as  to  die  for  Him. 


Princeton  Theoloqical  Seminary  Libraries 


1    1012  01247  0029 


Date  Due 

*1  w 

$ 

